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Uncontested JS seat = Tk.10 lakh

SHAKHAWAT LlTON
THE Election Commission has launched a campaign through posters and other means to encourage voters to pick competent and honest candidates in the January 5 election. One of the posters urges voters not to sell votes in exchange for money with a message saying selling vote is tantamount to selling conscience. The message couldn't be more correct.
In a competitive election voters are important. Candidates throng to the voters seeking their blessings and votes. Candidates also spend money to entertain voters in many ways. Sometimes they even give cash to buy votes. But this time around, the situation is completely different. In the January 5 one-sided election, voters of 153 constituencies have already been denied their voting rights. Candidates of those seats were declared uncontested. And in the remaining 147 constituencies, election results have almost been determined in absence of BNP-led opposition alliance and other parties. This is a completely one-sided game the ruling Awami League and its allies are playing. So, voters in the remaining 147 are not important too. In most constituencies candidates do not need to win voters' hearts to win the battle. So, question of selling votes does not arise so prominently this time.
But the ruling AL is doing brisk business with the uncontested candidates. It has asked the 127 candidates who were elected unopposed on AL nomination to donate Tk. 10 lakh each to the party fund. Why? The AL policymakers have found that the candidates who won unopposed did not need to spend money on electioneering. And it is unthinkable that one could become MP without spending anything. According to a report run by a Bangla daily on January 1, the AL treasurer has asked the 127 candidates to follow the party directive. And some of them, according to the report, have already donated the money to the party fund. The AL is expected to earn Tk. 12.70 crore through this. Earlier it had earned around Tk. 7 crore by selling nomination papers. So, the one-sided election has given the AL scope to earn at least Tk.20 crore. This amount is visible. We do not know whether there was any invisible transaction for party nominations. The answer lies in the existing culture of
nomination business by the major political parties. Allegation was raised against both AL and BNP that they did the nomination business in the run-up to the aborted January 22, 2007, 9lh parliamentary election.
The January 5 one-sided election had already been mired in controversy. Now AL's decision asking its 127 candidates to donate Tk. 10 lakh each to the party fund has lent another dimension to the voter-less election.
This may also prompt people to raise a question whether rich people who get elected as MPs will be able to buy posts in the new cabinet by donating to the AL fund. This will severely undermine the government's efforts to fight corruption because, if the party takes benefits from MPs and ministers, it will be unable to take action against them if they involve themselves in making wealth by abusing their office.
What step should be taken to stop this system of getting elected uncontested in future? One thing has been clear, that it is not deference of the voters towards a candidate that has got him/her elected uncontested. Rather, the ruling AL has maneuvered the election in such a way that it has set an unprecedented record of unopposed election. So, the existing electoral laws must be amended to scrap the system which allows candidates to get elected unopposed by denying voters the right to choose their representatives.
The 'No' vote system must be reintroduced with a provision that if only one candidate remains in the electoral race in any constituency, s/he will not be declared elected unopposed. Rather, voters of that constituency will be given the right to exercise their franchise to decide whether they want him/her as their representative. If they do not, voters will have the scope to cast 'No' vote. If'No' vote wins, then fresh election will be held in that constituency. And the candidate losing to the 'No' votes should not be allowed to contest in the fresh election in that constituency. If done, this will have an immense impact on the parties to nominate clean and honest candidates. This will also prevent the major political party from maneuvering the election. The country's democracy would not have been scandalised by the huge number of MPs getting elected unopposed in this election, had such a 'No' vote provision existed.
The writer is Senior Reporter, The Daily Star.