Today, Sunday, 18 January, a four-member delegation of Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami, led by organization’s Ameer Dr. Shafiqur Rahman met and held talks with the Chief Adviser of the Interim Government, Professor Dr. Muhammad Yunus.

The meeting took place at 6:30 pm at the state guest house Jamuna. Other members of the delegation included Jamaat’s Nayeb-e-Ameer Dr. Syed Abdullah Mohammad Taher; Secretary General and former Member of Parliament Mia Golam Porwar; and Assistant Secretary General Maulana Rafiqul Islam Khan.

After the meeting with the Chief Adviser, Dr. Syed Abdullah Mohammad Taher briefed journalists. During the briefing, he alleged that in the nomination scrutiny process, under the same rules, some nominations were declared valid while others were declared invalid. There were two major issues in this regard—candidates being loan defaulters and holding dual citizenship. The matter of concern is that despite allegations against some candidates of a major party, pressure is being exerted on the Election Commission to retain their candidacies.

He stated clearly, “We want to say in plain terms that decisions must be made in accordance with the RPO without yielding to any kind of pressure. If this is not done, the Election Commission will be considered by the public to have failed in holding a free and fair election. Moreover, it will be proven that the Commission is showing biasness towards a particular party, which will create public distrust.”

He further said that the head of a particular party is being provided with additional security and protocol by the government. If that is the case, then as the leader of another major political parties, Jamaat Ameer Dr. Shafiqur Rahman must also be given equal protocol. Otherwise, the principle of equal opportunity for all parties will be clearly violated.

He added that in some places, bias on the part of DC, SP and and Returning Officers has been observed. “We have already prepared a list of such officials and are still observing the situation. If the Election Commission does not take appropriate measures, we have informed the Chief Adviser of the need for his intervention in this matter. We have also drawn attention to the fact that some advisers around the Chief Adviser are misleading him regarding holding a free and fair election.”

He thanked the Chief Adviser for allocating the necessary funds to install CCTV cameras at every polling center. He further said that in order to protect the secrecy of the vote, they informed the Chief Adviser that no force—not even the army—should be deployed inside polling centers. The Chief Adviser assured them that nothing of that sort would happen. “Our position is that they should remain outside the booths and take the highest measures to maintain law and order. They have no role inside the booths.”

He also noted that it was surprising that the Chief Adviser stated, “I am not informed about many things.” They advised him to put in place a mechanism to ensure that he is kept informed of all important matters.