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By the Numbers

The amended RPO

As the amended RPO has already been passed into law, the political parties are now to register with the EC for being eligible to contest in the parliamentary election. All the major political parties will be required to amend their constitutions to fulfill the criteria set forth for registration. Registration may be cancelled if a party violates the provisions laid down in the amended RPO.

A.N.M. Nurul Haque
THE government promulgated the Representation of the People Order (Amendment) Ordinance 2008 on August 19. with a number of amendments, and the amended version of the RPO 1972 was put into force on August 21 with immediate effect. The amended RPO has made registration of political parties compulsory, and also banned their front organisations.
The reconstituted Election Commission (EC) initiated a commendable move for registration of political parties, fulfilling eight conditions, to bring them under a regulatory framework.
The people felt encouraged by the EC's proposed electoral reforms, particularly the move to register political parties with necessary reforms in the present interregnum so that democracy could be sustainable. After few days, the EC relaxed some conditions for registration of the politicalparties.
According to the amended RPO, an existing political party would
be eligible for registration if it had won at least one constituency in any parliamentary election since independence, or secured at least five percent of total votes in the constituencies contested.
A new political party would be eligible for registration if it had organisational committees in at least ten districts and 50 upazilas. All committees must be elected with a target of getting 33 percent women leaders irt them by 2012.
Article 90B (l)(a)(iv) of the amended RPO stipulates that for registration of political parties, and to qualify for contesting in the general elections, the parties arc required to get nominations forwarded by local level committees of every constituency and get these approved by the central body.
According to Article 90B (l)(b)(ii) of the amended RPO, political parties will have to incorporate a provision in their constitutions to get elected members on their committees at all levels, including the central committee, for registration.
This is surely a welcome development that provides opportuni-
ties to the grassroots leaders to play a greater role in running the parly democratically.
As there were no official criteria set forth for formation of a political party, we saw a vast outgrowth of political parties over the years. Most of these parties have failed to emerge as responsible, accountable and transparent organisations to turn social thought into political actions.
Consensus on a common national agenda has also become hard to achieve, because of the existence of so many political parties with different ideologies.
The EC had moved before to make registration mandatory for all parties. But the major parties opposed it, forcing the EC to make it optional before the 2001 parliamentary election. The major parties, which are still opposing it, should realise that the proposed reforms are urged not only by the EC but by the whole nation as well.
As the amended RPO has already been passed into law, the political parties are now to register with the EC for being eligible to contest in the parliamentary election.
All the major political parties will be required to amend their constitutions to fulfill the criteria set forth for registration. Registration may be cancelled if a party violates the provisions laid down in the amended RPO.
The leaders of the major parties have argued that they are not in a position to comply with the toughened conditions for registration with the EC as the state of emergency still exists and amending party constitution is a timeconsuming process that requires approval from the national councilsession.
According to the election roadmap, registration of parties was supposed to be completed by the end of June. Now they have only two months -- September and October -- to complete registration with the EC. With their chiefs and key leaders in jail, they will really find it difficult to fulfill all the criteria set forth for registration.
According to the amended RPO provisions, the parties will have to sever relations with their front organisations and do away with their chapters abroad. Three
major political parties -- Awami League, BNP and Jatiya Party -will each need to sever relations with at least 17 of their front organisations to fulfill the criteria for registration.
With the promulgation of the new RPO, government officials who resigned or retired from service will not be able to contest the parliamentary elections unless a period of three years has elapsed since ihc date of resignation or retirement.
In the event of removal or dismissal or compulsory retirement, a former bureaucrat aspiring to public office will have to wait for five years after retirement from service. It is really a commendable step taken by the caretaker government to put an end to the political ambitions of many bureaucrats who, in the past, had exploited their official position to lay the groundwork for their bid to contest in the general election after retirement.
The amended RPO also bars defaultersofbankloans and utility bills from running in the parliamentary election. As for the war criminals, the amended RPO debars from parliamentary election those convicted of war crimes by a national or international court or tribunal.
If we compare our amended RPO with the relevant sections relating to corrupt practices and electoral offences of the Indian Representation of the People Act 1951, it gives us a sense of satisfaction as it has somewhat been
equipped to deal with our cumbrous electoral process.
But the retraction of the caretaker government of its decision to add a provision to the amended RPO, to disqualify contestants convicted by a trial court for crimi nal offences involving moral turpitude, has greatly frustrated every conscious citizen of the country.
It seems that the caretaker government had not been able to learn the lessons derived from the local body elections, where most of the candidates elected in the mayoral and councilor posts arc accused in various criminal cases ,
If the caretaker government and the EC fail to debar such people from contesting in the upazila and national elections, then all the development so far made to release the country's politics from the grip of the corrupt, crooked and criminal will boil down to a farce.
Bringing the political parties under a regulatory framework is long overdue, and enforcing registration is the first crucial step. Political pathology tends to believe that the political system in the country needs reforms to conform to the democratic dictum.
Implementation of the new RPO will make politics free from the caprice of parties and persons, and the political landscape of the country will be drastically changed for durable democracy.
AN M. Nurul Haque a a columnist for The Daily Star