AB Party meets EU election expert mission

Amar Bangladesh Party, AB Party, met the ‘European Union election expert mission to Bangladesh 2023’ on Saturday morning in an uptown area of the capital, says a press release of the party.

David Noel Ward, team leader and electoral expert, and Alexander Matus, a political expert, represented the Mission.

Supreme Court lawyer and AB Party joint convenor Tajul Islam, member secretary Mojibur Rahman Monju and both Barrister-at-law and joint member secretary Asaduzzaman Fuaad and Zubair Ahmed Bhuiyan were present at the meeting.

EU mission experts were, at the very outset, interested to learn about the AB Party, its objectives, programmes and policy based politics, in particular.

AB Party leaders explained the organisational structure, activities across the country, potentials of new generation politics and challenges faced, specially by law enforcement agencies and ruling party militias.

Denial of electoral registration to AB Party by the election commission was also raised. The EU mission was updated on the outstanding judicial review application at the High Court.

AB Party delegation raised concern about the lack of level playing field in the forthcoming election. Unlawful detention of around 20 thousand pro-democracy activists since October 2023 and falsely convicting close to six hundred top opposition leadership are certainly not conducive to any free, fair, participatory and credible election.

Political violence leading up to election and afterwards is also a concern for the AB Party.

Fake political parties and dummy candidates from the ruling party also undermines the credibility of the election.

Even smaller parties are having ever-shrinking democratic space on the street. Post-election scenarios might deteriorate and violent civil unrest gets sporadic, AB Party feels concerned.

Neither the government nor the EC had shown any interest into holding an acceptable election by all quarters, they opined.