MOHAMMAD AL-MASUM MOLLA

Though the BNP has said it will not take part in the coming elections to five city corporations, the party fears that some of its leaders may run in the polls violating its directive.

Going beyond the party’s decision, BNP leaders Taimur Alam Khandaker and Monirul Haque Sakku had contested the last polls to Narayanganj and Cumilla city corporations as independents and both of them were defeated.

Party insiders said local BNP leaders who have been working in their electoral areas for a long time may join the city polls.

“We have decided that we will not take part in any election under the incumbent government. So, if anyone violates the party’s order, we will take steps after seeing the situation,” Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, secretary general of the BNP, told The Daily Star yesterday.

He said those who contested city polls previously going against the party’s decision were expelled. “We are in a movement. So, there is no question of joining any polls under the incumbent government.”

The Election Commission has already announced the schedule for the polls to five city corporations -- Gazipur, Sylhet, Khulna, Barishal and Rajshahi. In the 2018 polls to those five city corporations, AL candidates won four mayoral posts while the BNP’s nominee became victorious in one.

The opposition party’s candidates won all five mayoral polls in those cities in 2013.