Munira Khan, chief of Fair Election Monitoring Alliance (FEMA), the country’s leading election monitoring organization, yesterday claimed that the average turn out in the 10th parliamentary polls was below ten per cent. “I personally visited many polling centers and our observers from different parts of the country also sent their reports, and according to the reports, the average turn out was below ten percent,” she told the Independent. Advocate AK Azad, director of rights body Bangladesh Manabodhikar Commission, in a statement, also claimed that the average turn out in yesterday’s polls was on ten percent. According to the EC, only four foreign observers – two from each India and Bhutan — monitored the general election. However, a total of 585 foreign observers from 18 agencies monitored the ninth general election in 2008. Reportedly, some 30 local organisations deployed a total of 13,341 observers to monitor the 2014 national election, whereas 75 local organisations deployed nearly 1,60,000 observers in the 2008 general election which had got widespread acceptance both at home and abroad.
-With The Independent input
