National Citizen Party (NCP) spokesperson Asif Mahmud Sajib Bhuiyan has accused the Election Commission of bias by commenting that two candidates have been purposely maligned.
Asif Mahmud claimed that the election commission (EC) should have earlier condemned BNP chairman Tariq Rahman for the reason that two candidates of his party were condemned.
Today, Monday (January 19), chief advisor Dr. A meeting of NCP delegation led by Nahid Islam was held with Muhammad Yunus. Asif Mahmud made such a comment while talking to the journalists after the meeting.
Asif Mahmud said about the EC’s complaint against NCP’s Nahid Islam and Naseeruddin Patwari, “Where no action is being taken due to breaking the rules, clear rules are not being taken, we see that such complaints are being given purposely with the connivance of political parties, Election Commission and Returning Officer to make our candidates controversial despite following the complete rules.” The government is also clearly campaigning for a “yes” vote in the referendum. Our candidates are doing it, so are we; Now this is our party position; We call on people to vote ‘Yes’ in the referendum to implement the reforms.’
At that time, Asif Mahmud pointed to BNP Chairman Tariq Rahman and said, ‘But it is being said about the election campaign just for the sake of the picture, but we saw with great concern, when the chairman of a party came to the country when the election campaign was banned, we welcomed him from our place, the whole Dhaka city was covered with his picture, wherever we went throughout the country, we saw his picture. If just posting the picture is a violation of code of conduct, then he should be mourned first.’
Asif Mahmud also said, ‘Principal and policy should be equal for all. If the policy is applied to a particular party or to a particular candidate, we feel it will bring controversy to the Election Commissioner and the entire electoral system. We demand that the condolence given by the Election Commission and the Returning Officer should be withdrawn as soon as possible and a proper explanation should be given to the people as to why the condolence was done illegally.’
It is to be noted that the Election Commission has condemned NCP convener Nahid Islam and the party’s chief coordinator Nasiruddin Patwari for violating the code of conduct of the 13th National Assembly elections. In the letter, the EC mentioned that large billboards with ‘huge colored pictures’ of the candidates (Nahid and Naseeruddin) and the slogan ‘Say ‘Yes’ to the referendum’ have been put up at various important places in Dhaka-11 and 8 constituencies; Which is directly against election code of conduct.
According to the EC’s letter, as per Rule No. 18 of the National Parliament Election Conduct Rules, 2025, no registered political party or candidate can start any election campaign three weeks (21 days) before the scheduled polling day. This notice has been given to them for violating this rule.
