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EC struggles to get party audit reports in time

Pankag Karmakar
The Election Commission is struggling to make the registered political parties submit their annual financial transaction reports in time, let alone scrutinise those afterwards.
As per the Political Parties Registration Rule, 2008, the parties must submit the annual financial reports audited by a chartered accountant firm within July 31 the next year.
But breaching the rules, the commission extended the submission deadline in most of the past years, as
major parties like the Awami League and the BNP missed it.
Though such submission was made mandatory with the aim to ensure transparency in the financial matters of the parties, the EC never checked their authenticity.
The demand for scrutiny was there from different quarters.
Political parties started submitting their financial statements in 2010 during the tenure of former chief election commissioner ATM Shamsul Huda, said EC officials.
Last year the commission gave an
additional one month to over a dozen parties including the AL and the Jatiya Party for their submissions.
Similarly the AL, the BNP and some other political organisations sought one to one and a half months' time this year too to submit their reports.
Talking about the practice, former election commissioner M Sakhawat Hussain told The Daily Star that there was no way to extend time, as the deadline was specified in the rules.
"This legal provision was introduced during our tenure. Initially
we relaxed enforcement as political parties were not familiar with the culture. But it should not go on for long," he viewed.
However, election commissioner Shah Nawaz thinks if the EC wants to strictly enforce the legal provision, it might cause difficulties.
If the major parties cannot submit reports in time, it will create further problems, he told The Daily Star. "So I don't see anything wrong in extending the deadline."
If a party fails to submit its financial report for three consecutive years, it will lose its registration with the EC, according to the rules.
About EC's negligence to scrutinise the reports, Sakhawat Hussain said the statements were useless, if not examined.
"I think these financial statements of political parties should be made public for transparency."
Even some senior field level officials of the EC recently proposed to develop an effective mechanism for scrutinising the authenticity of these statements.
In response to this, EC Secretary Sirazul Islam said, "As the reports are audited by a registered chartered accountant firm, there is no need for further scrutiny. ”