America has a long history of democracy and Bangladesh certainly has many things to learn from them but the United States can learn a thing or two from us too, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) KM Nurul Huda said Thursday.
“America can’t count all votes within four-five days, and we announce the count within 10 to 20 minutes using EVM which America doesn't have,” he said after visiting a polling station at Dhaka-18 in the morning, reports UNB.
Huda said America failed to address this issue with their 250 years of democratic practice and they also don’t have a central election commission.
Appreciating the advanced voting system of America, where the ballot boxes are ‘kept in the open’, the CEC said: “In Bangladesh, I’ve seen that when we keep election materials in treasury, people rigged votes after opening them.”
Such cases also went to the court where investigations revealed that votes were rigged from the treasury, Huda said.
“So, our people and journalists have many things to learn from America as well.”
‘By-polls peaceful’
Meanwhile, the by-polls to Sirajganj-1 and Dhaka-18 were being held peacefully with no allegation of vote rigging or irregularities, said Huda.
“I’ve been contacting returning officers of different polling stations and they said the election was peaceful and no incident of vote rigging or irregularities was reported,” he said.
Talking about the low turnout, the CEC said it is a matter of research. “Specialists can explain the matter after scrutinising different aspects of local polls and national election.”
Referring to BNP's allegation of vote rigging, he said no-one filed any complaint about vote rigging with the Election Commission.
“I believe BNP’s allegations are not right,” he said.
