100 accused in murder case
Staff Correspondent
Of 1579 candidates contesting the national parliamentary election from 299 constituencies, 100 are accused in murder case and 48 are facing corruption cases.
Out of 100 candidates accused in murder cases, 24 are contesting from the Awami League, 34 from BNP and the rest from other political parties.
This was disclosed at a press conference organized by Sushasaner Jonnya Nagorik (SUJON) held at the Dhaka Reporters Unity on Thursday. SUJON Chief Muzaffar Ahmed and former advisers to the caretaker government Hafizuddin Ahmed and ASM Shahjahan addressed the press briefing.
After analyzing the information of the candidates, it has been found that 80 per cent of total candidates’ are graduates. “Among the total candidates of 1579, 80 per cent are businessmen who are contesting the national parliament election. Taking BNP-led four-party alliance tickets, some 58 per cent businessmen are contesting in the general election while 50 per cent businessmen have got tickets from the Awami League-led grand alliance. Besides, candidates from different organisations and lawyers are also contesting the polls. As a result, the real politicians have been ignored by their respective political parties,” Muzaffar said.
“The Election Commission (EC) is showing leniency to the candidates gradually. The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) Chairman has been instructed by the government not to be rigid to allow and ensure participation of all kinds of candidates in the polls. We think like ACC, the Election Commission has also been asked to show softness to candidates by the government,” Muzaffar said.
He said we all want to see a free, fair and credible election but it has not been evaluated whether the candidates are honest and dedicated. “Even we don’t see or investigate whether the candidates’ information provided in their affidavit are false or true. If the candidates are not clean, it would not be possible to a good parliament by holding a free, fair and acceptable election as many candidates are also facing various criminal cases and are involved in crimes and corruption,” he added.
He said most of the candidates don’t have consistency between income and expenditure. “On the other hand, Election Commission’s attitude to cancel candidatures applying section 91 (E) in the RPO is not proper,” Muzaffar said.
Courtesy: thebangladeshtoday.com
