EC maps out plan for national vote in December

The Election Commission led by AMM Nasir Uddin is preparing an “action plan” with the aim of holding the 13th national election in December.

According to EC officials, around two dozen lists on various election-related topics must be prepared six months before the polls. Hence, they are working on a plan resembling a roadmap.

"The action plan will be published in June or July after the preliminary preparations are complete," said Election Commissioner Anwarul Islam.

"It's crystal clear that the election will be held in December. Now we have to publish the action plan by June or July to remove any confusion," he said.

In recent electoral cycles, such plans have typically been published months ahead of the election schedule. The last EC presented an action plan for the 12th general election in September 2022, while the plan for the 11th election came in October 2018. For the 10th parliamentary election, a roadmap was prepared two years in advance.

The commission prepares a pre-election “primary action plan” before announcing the poll schedule and “action and implementation plan” after the schedule announcement to make its task easier.

The then commission announced a roadmap for the first time in 2007-2008. A one-and-a-half-year roadmap was announced on Jul 15, 2007, which mentioned an election schedule announcement and polling timetable in October to December. Then the authorities began to draft the voter list with photographs. The election was held on Dec 29, 2008, following that voter list after an amendment to laws and rules and political party registration.

Later that became known as a roadmap, action plan or even checklist which the EC continued to prepare.

The Nasir Uddin-led commission took over in November 2024 after the shift in power through a mass uprising. The commission will complete its first six months in May and the voter list will also be updated by then.

If the election is held in December, the commission has to complete their task of holding the general election within 13 months of its tenure.

The interim government has said that, based on the progress of ongoing reform work, the election was likely to be held in December 2025 or in the first quarter of 2026.

However, the EC says December 2025 is the target. Hence it will complete the preparatory works by July and August and exchange opinions with stakeholders. It also plans to announce the election schedule in October.

Reform of laws and regulations regarding the new party registration, demarcation, Representation of People Order (RPO), election code of conduct, policy on local and international election observers and journalists, voting rights of the expatriates, and purchase of election equipment is also being done.

The commission is reviewing the tentative timeframe for the exchange of opinions with political parties, stakeholders, inter-ministry meetings, election budget finalisation, meeting with law enforcing agencies and top officials in local administration, the briefing of returning and assistant returning officers, deployment of executive and judicial magistrates, preparing panels of election officers, training, manual printing, nomination form printing.

The action plan includes hundreds of issues before and after the election schedule announcement ranging from voter list printing, poll centre management, ballot box supply to publishing gazette of election results.

Commissioner Anwarul said this should be called an action plan rather than a roadmap.

"The documentary roadmap, which is usually done, will be completed soon, In Sha Allah. It will be published. We want to ensure that. Our draft plan is already done, and we just need to add the date and time. We need to finish the (preparatory work) before declaring the schedule. We must announce it by July-August."

"We plan to announce the schedule in October, 60-70 days before the election."

Amid the ongoing dialogues held by the National Consensus Commission and the Electoral Reform Commission’s recommendations, the government asked the Election Commission to draft a proposal for law and policy reforms that can be implemented soon.

The EC believes this will not cause any complications.

“There aren’t any conflicts. As a constitutional organisation, the EC will take the initiative to hold unbiased, transparent and fair elections. There’ll be no confrontation or conflict with anyone. Everyone will cooperate with the EC. We’ll also recommend reforms that can be done soon,” said Anwarul.

He said, “We’re preparing with December as the target election month. The voter list will be done by June. As many as 6.2 million new and dropped-out voters will be added. The names of almost 2 million dead voters will be removed from the existing list.”

The election commissioner said they were preparing poll centres and other election activities with the assumption that the total number of voters would be more than 125 million.

The main focus was on political party registration, he said. It would not be possible to allow parties to register one month before the announcement of the election schedule. Party registration and gazette publication should be done before the election schedule announcement.

“Therefore, we plan to scrutinise and complete the task by July and August.”

All policies and regulations will be in line with the electoral law and the RPO. The EC will publish gazettes “in time”, Anwarul said.

He said proposals to amend the RPO and other electoral laws were underway.

The RPO should be amended to include the “proxy voting” system for the expatriates. A draft of the election code of conduct has been made. A reform proposal regarding the demarcation of constituencies has also been presented to the government.

The EC submitted a proposal in “coordination” with the recommendations drawn by the Electoral Reform Commission, Anwarul said.

“We’re targeting December and proceeding accordingly. If we consider the standard time of 60 days, we have to announce the schedule in October. We need to arrange a huge workforce, training, party registrations, consulting civil society, and stakeholders, and exchange of opinions with law enforcement agencies, administration, and ministries by August and September.”

The existing law and order situation is “in favour” of holding the election, the commissioner believes.

“The administration and law and order situation is stable now. Definitely, the situation has improved. If it improves further in the next couple of months, we hope it will remain good until December. The most important factors for the election are law and order and the administration. Everyone has to be impartial and follow the law.”