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AL excels in unfair polls

Makes almost a clean sweep in final round of upazila elections

Staff Correspondent
Ruling Awami League men took things in their own hands to produce an almost clean sweep in the final round of the upazila polls yesterday, stretching the lead of AL-backed candidates over their rival BNP-blessed ones.
In the elections, marred by capture of polling centres and ballot-box stuffing, AL-supported candidates won 51 chairman posts while their rivals backed by the BNP secured just 12.
Jamaat-favoured contenders won three chairman posts and Parbatya Chattagram Jana Sanghati Samiti (PCJSS) runners two.
Candidates supported by the Jatiya Party, the opposition in parliament, failed to win a single chairman post. AL rebels won three, BNP rebel one and an UPDF-backed candidate won one chairman post.
With the results of 455 upazila parishads in after five phases, the ruling AL-blessed chairman candidates won 225 posts while their challengers favoured by the BNP got 157.
Jamaat-e-lslami-backed candidates secured 35 chairman posts and Jatiya Party won three.
The results in three upazilas are withheld.
The AL favourites had been trailing the BNP-backed candidates in the first three phases of the polls held on February 19, 27, and March 15.
They had closed the gap in the third phase, which was marked by violence and election rigging.
In the fourth phase of polls on March 23, marred by widespread polls rigging, the AL-blessed secured 29 more chairman posts than their rivals favoured by the BNP, giving them a 27-post lead.
Yesterday, supporters of the AL-backed candidates intensified their unlawful activities, like capturing polling stations and stuffing ballot boxes, and made sure AL-favoured contenders got the victories.
The AL-blessed runners got a sweeping victory in all the 21 upazilas where BNP-backed contenders boycotted the polls in the early hours protesting election rigging by ruling party men.
In those upazilas, the AL-blessed candidates won by huge margins.
For example, in Chhagalnaiya upazila of Feni, the AL-favoured chair-
man candidate won by bagging 59,577 votes and his nearest rival, BNP blessed, got just 10,507, even though the upazila is considered BNP chief Khaleda Zia's backyard.
In Satkhira Sadar upazila, the AL-blessed candidate got 1,52,851 votes and his rival backed by Jamaat got 44,217 votes. In Debhata upazila of Satkhira, the AL contender secured 53,172 votes and his Jamaat-blessed challenger got only 7,750.
In Tala upazila of the same district, the AL-favourite won the chairman post getting 1,10,628 votes and the Jamaat-backed candidate received 37,946 votes.
In the three upazilas of Satkhira, the candidates blessed by the AL also won all the six vice-chairman posts, including those reserved for women.
Five years ago, the AL-backed candidates won 44 chairman posts in the polls to the same 73 upazila parishads. The elections were held within a month after the December 29, 2008, lauded parliamentary polls in which the AL had a landslide victory.
Both the AL and BNP had made efforts to pick a single candidate for each post of an upazila parishad by persuading their rebels to quit the race or back off. But rebels were still there in every phase of the polls chipping away at the party vote banks.
The upazila polls had become a prestige issue for both the AL and the BNP as the outcome of the elections would indicate gain or loss of their popularity. The parties had engaged in the elections so much that the nonpartisan nature of the polls was lost.