Was Awami League wrong in holding partisan local govt elections?

While discussion and debate still continue about the Jatiya Sangsad election held on 7 January, the local government elections have now come into focus too. The election commission wants to hold the upazila election from March in phases, according to news reports.

Then a meeting held on Monday (22 January), Awami League announced that party nomination (boat symbol) would not be given for the local government elections, including the upazila polls. (Prothom Alo, 23 January 2024)

The local government elections were originally non-partisan, with any party symbol. It was during the Awami League rule in 2015 that this was changed and the elections were held with party nominations. From then on these elections were held on party nominations. So now why has Awami League this time decided not to give nominations from the party this time? Does this decision of the ruling party signify that the decision to hold local government polls under party banners was an error?

After the 5 January 2014 one-sided election, Awami League formed the government for the second consecutive time.

After that, the party's general secretary at the time, Syed Ashraful Islam, for the first time raised to issue of holding the local government elections under party banner. Later the party's top leader agreed to this.

From the very outset the issue of holding the local government election on a party basis gave rise to debate. Those in power argued that local government elections in all developed countries are held on a party basis and so this should be done in Bangladesh too. BNP and several other opposition parties were opposed to this. They saw a sinister motive behind this, a ploy of the government to ensure its own party leaders won.

It was not just the opposition parties, but several civil society groups that also expressed their apprehensions in this regard. But no heed was paid to either the opposition not civil society. The law pertaining to local government elections was amended.

Then in 2015-16 and 2020 the pourashava elections, in 2016 and 2021-22 the union parishad polls, in 2019 the upazila parishad elections and then the city corporations election are various times, were held, all on the political party basis. The opposition BNP shunned many of these elections.

After the cabinet approved the matter of local government elections being held on a partisan basis, the local government minister at the time, Khandakar Musharraf Hossain, praised it highly. He said that if the party symbols are used in the local government polls, this would prevent clashes and violence. But quite the opposition occurred. There was an unprecedented outbreak of violence in 2016 when for the first time the union parishad election was held under party banner. Around 150 persons were killed in election violence at the time, the media reported.

While the violence was not that extreme in the city corporation, upazila, parishad and pourashava elections, there were allegations of numerous irregularities. One of the major allegations was that the police and the administration displayed bias in favour of the ruling party candidates. As a result, the number of candidates plummeted in these elections and in many areas candidates won uncontested.

With a rare exception here and there, it was basically the ruling party candidates and their 'rebel' candidates that swept the elections. And so like the 2014 national election, the local government elections became one-sided too.        

It was after the 2014 one-sided national election that Awami League as a party decided to have the local government polls on partisan basis. The question is, why has the party decided to change this stand after yet another one-sided election in 2024?

This time in the national election Awami League resorted to fielding 'dummy' candidates as a strategy to lend the election a semblance of competition.

As a result of this 'dummy candidate ' strategy, party leaders in many areas contested as independent candidates. This election held among themselves also resulted in violence and even deaths in several places, with large numbers left injured. The strife spread down to the grassroots.

Awami League leaders, at a meeting of the party on Monday, discussed the matter of this party conflict. They came to a conclusion at the meeting rifts had emerged at the grassroots due to party and independent candidates contesting in the Jatiya Sangsad election. Now if anyone was given the party symbol at the local government election, others would contest independently.

Other than preventing party conflict or strife, Awami League also wants to increase the voter turnout at the local government election and make it participatory. At the Monday meeting, the prime minister herself said that for the time being, no one will be given party nomination at the local government election. This will make the election festive and participatory.

It may be noted that there are questions about the election commission's figures that maintain a 41.80 per cent voter turnout at the national election.

Not only the opposition, but several parties and candidates that took part in the election as well as local and foreign researchers have raised questions and allegations about the voter turnout.

Awami League has not officially acknowledged these allegations about the 7 January election. But the local government elections immediately after the national polls have created apprehensions and so they are changing their strategy. Is this an 'acknowledgement' of the questions and allegations pertaining to the 7 January election?

Of the three consecutive election (2014, 2018 and 2024), two (2014 and 2024) were one-sided and the other (2018) was questionable. The voters have lost their interest in voting. Our election system has been rendered ineffective. It has become the election culture simply to win the election is any way possible. So when the ruling quarters simply change their strategy concerning the local government election, would it be realistic to expect a change in the election culture?

* Monzurul Islam is a senior sub-editor at Prothom Alo

* This column appeared in the print and online edition of Prothom Alo and has been rewritten for the English edition by Ayesha Kabir