Persons convicted under the Bangladesh Collaborators (Special Tribunals) Order, 1972, and convicted of crimes against humanity would be out of the national electoral race and voters’ list, the Cabinet has decided in its regular meeting on Monday. “As per the Constitution’s provisions, any person can be enlisted as a voter for the parliamentary elections if not convicted under the Bangladesh Collaborators (Special Tribunals) Order, 1972,” Cabinet secretary Musharraf Hossain Bhuiyan announced following the meeting, over which Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina presided.
The Bangladesh Collaborators (Special Tribunals) Order was introduced in 1972 for the trial of those who sided with the Pakistani army during the Liberation War. But on December 31, 1975, the law was scrapped, after Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman was assassinated earlier that year.
All the convicts were also released. The names of these convicts have been enlisted in the voters’ lists for the nine elections held in the country since independence.
According to the sources in the Election Commission (EC), on March 19, the commission sent a letter to the home ministry seeking the list of convicted collaborators who were punished in 1972. On May 25, the home ministry sent the list of the 47 convicted collaborators.
According to the list, 31 convicted collaborators of Comilla, seven of Noakhali, four of Rajbari, four of Chittagong and one of Jhenaidah have been convicted and sentenced to different terms in jail. “We have not received the minutes of the meeting.
After getting them, we will respond to the media,” a senior EC official said on condition that he is not quoted. In a letter on June 21, the Election Commission decided to exclude the names of the convicted collaborators of 1971 from the voters’ list.
The EC source said the new Act is expected to be implemented before the voters’ list is finalised ahead of the upcoming national polls. The EC has already issued an instruction to the National Identity Department (NID) in this connection.
In accordance with the decision, the EC has sent the proposal for an amendment to the Representation of the People Order (RPO), aiming to keep persons convicted of crimes against humanity out of the national electoral race.
A proposal for the amendment to the Voter Act, 2009, has also been sent in this regard. “Section 66 of the Constitution also disqualifies any convict from participating in any election under the same law. The Representation of the People’s Order (RPO) also debars those convicted by national or international courts and tribunals from participating in parliamentary elections,” a senior EC official told The Independent, preferring anonymity.
Meanwhile, the Jamaat-e-Islami in July has sent a letter to the EC secretariat by hand. The Islamist party’s move came in the wake of the EC’s declaration that the war crimes convicts were not only losing the right to run for elections, but their names were also being dropped from the voters’ list. In this context, it may be mentioned that the two tribunals dealing with war crimes cases have so far delivered verdicts in six cases.
The Tribunal-1 awarded a 90-year jail term to former Jamaat-e-Islami chief Ghulam Azam for his wartime offences, See while Jamaat leader Delawar Hossain Sayedee was awarded capital punishment. The Tribunal-2 gave the death penalty to Jamaat secretary general Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojaheed, Jamaat assistant secretary general Muhammad Kamaruzzaman and expelled Jamaat leader Abul Kalam Azad, and awarded another assistant secretary general Abdul Quader Mollah a life term.
-With The Independent input
