DHAKA, 19 December 2004 — Aspirants from the ruling and opposition parties in Bangladesh have started frantic lobbying to get their names at the top of the list of possible nominees for women’s reserved seats in the 300-member Parliament, although the provision for election to those seats has been challenged in the High Court.
The government of Prime Minister Khaleda Zia decided to hold elections to 45 reserved seats, introduced through constitutional amendment this year, by late January next year, while the country’s women leaders are challenging the provisions for elections in the court.
Women leaders of the parties had started the lobbying long before the provision came into effect, and now they are desperate to persuade their higher-ups to give them seats in the Parliament, political insiders said in Dhaka yesterday.
Other components of the ruling Bangladesh Nationalist Party-led alliance, the main opposition Awami League, the Jatiya Party (Ershad) and a possible alliance of small parties and independent lawmakers have their proportionate shares of the 45 seats.
Twenty-nine sets will go to the BNP and two of its allies — the Bangladesh Jatiya Party and Islami Oikya Jote, three to the Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh, the other partner of the ruling coalition, nine to the Awami League, two to the Jatiya Party, and two to the possible alliance of small and independent parties.
The parties are yet to announce the timing of their parliamentary board meetings to nominate candidates for the seats.
It is learnt that the parties will nominate more candidates for the seats than that of their proportionate shares as the number of aspirants is higher than that of the seats. Then the candidates have to compete in the election, in which MPs will vote.
According to the BNP insiders, aspirants from the women’s wing of the party and former leaders of student front Jatiyatabadi Chhatra Dal have been lobbying the Prime Minister’s Office and the political office of the Prime Minister Hawa Bhaban or trying to get the support of influential leaders.
The lobbyists also swarmed the offices of influential ministers and their residences, and are not missing any program which the prime minister attends to ensure their berth in Parliament known as Jatiya Sangsad. There are some 100 aspirants in the BNP.
BNP sources said the party and its allies would prepare a list of women for the reserved seats sometime in early January. The party will later prepare a shorter list.
The parliamentary board of the party, led by the prime minister and BNP chairperson, Khaleda Zia, will nominate the candidates.
The names of some front-ranking leaders in the BNP and Mahila Dal and some former JCD leaders have been included in the short list, he said. “The prime minister will have her own list.”
Some eminent women, who are not directly attached with BNP activities, but are believed to be well-wishers of the party and have contributed to it, will also be included in the short list.
Some university teachers, lawyers, NGO representatives, top-level corporate executives and businesswomen will also be included in the list.
Refugee Repatriation
Bangladesh yesterday started working on resumption of repatriation of Rohingya Muslim refugees, after Myanmar’s recent agreement to accept more than 6,000 of them.
“We have recently got the clearance for acceptance of 6,622 Rohingya refugees for repatriation to their home state of Rakhaine (Arakan) and we hope to resume the process soon,” Foreign Secretary Shamsher Mobin Chowdhury told newsmen in Dhaka.
“There is yet no agreed time-frame for the resumption of the repatriation process.”
The foreign ministry sources, however, expect that the process would start in a couple of months.
