A REPORT in our daily stated that the final phase of updating the voter list began in 120 upazilas in Dhaka and Chittagong divisions on Monday. Those who turned 18 in January, 2014 and those who were not enlisted before as voters will be eligible for becoming voters. They will be photographed and their finger prints will be scanned, sources in the EC said. In the third phase, data collection started on September 1 and will continue till September 10 at 120 upazilas. Photo shoot and registration will continue from September 18 to November 15, said EC officials.
The first phase began in the coastal and the marshy areas on May 15. The second phase began in the townships after that. More than 400 upazilas have so far been covered. Over 60,000 people are engaged and about Tk 590 million will be spent to complete the project by November. A draft list will be published early next year, said the CEC. Around 10.32 lakh new voters of 144 upazilas were included in the electoral roll due to registration in the first two phases. Of the new voters, around 5.87 lakh are males and around 4.45 lakh are females, according to a statement of the Election Commission.
Unfortunately the voter list update started on May 15 with poor publicity. People of different upazilas did not know when the programme would start and how the list would be updated. Besides, data collectors and supervisors could not start work in many areas due to the unavailability of registration forms and other materials. The programme was supposed to start at 182 upazilas in the first phase.
It is for the second time that the voter list has been updated in the last two years – both under the aegis of the current government. While ordinarily one would expect a free and fair process in this country such things may not be taken for granted. It is possible that non existent or even dead people could be enrolled as voters to benefit a particular party. This padding of the voter list, while harmless if a truly free and fair election takes place, spells dire consequences for democracy if such an election were to be undertaken under a non neutral administration.
The ability of citizens to exercise their right to franchise remains at the heart of democracy. Exercises such as gerrymandering and padding voter lists serves to distort the ability of people to exercise their rights while favouring one political party over another. This unfair advantage, if built into the electoral process, serves only to favour a select few while negating the true wishes of the electorate. Along with violence, intimidation and ballot box stuffing, these remain a cancer in our democratic process and must be stopped through the sincere attempts of the EC. Unfortunately the political will to do so remains non existent.
