A total of 77 candidates vying for the posts of director of the executive board of Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association filed their nomination papers on Monday.
The contestants are mainly grouped in two panels— one led by the incumbent vice-president Shafiul Islam Mohiuddin and the other by former BGMEA president Anwar-Ul-Alam Chowdhury Parvez.
Parvez is leading the “Forum” panel while Mohiuddin is leading the “Sammilito Parishad” panel.
A total of 77 nominations have been received, Belal Ahmed, an official of the BGMEA Election Board. told New Age last evening.
The board was scrutinizing the nomination papers and the primary list was scheduled to be published last night.
Polls at the BGMEA will be held on February 24 and last date for withdrawing candidatures is 5th of February.
BGMEA sources said as it happens every time some candidates would withdraw their candidatures leaving only the two panels on the election fray.
The 27-strong BGMEA board has 20 directors from the factory owners in the Dhaka region and 7 from Chittagong region.
BGMEA rules have it that on the next day of the polls, the winning panel elects the president and three vice-presidents as the office bearers for the next two-year term.
Rules also have it that the first vice-president post goes to a director
elected from Chittagong region.
A total of 3,259 factory owners have been listed as the valid voters of the BGMEA this time with 2,665 from Dhaka region and 594 from Chittagong.
BGMEA is the apex trade body of the country’s export-oriented garment manufacturing sector and, according to BGMEA officials; its members share nearly three-fourths of the country’s entire export proceeds from apparel shipments.
The country’s sector, which employs more than three million workers, earned about $15 billion in foreign exchange last year [January-December 2010].