Atiqul bags votes more than Annisul- Tabith’s combined total

Awami League candidate Atiqul Islam has polled votes more than what Annisul Islam and his nearest rival Tabith Awat did as a whole in the 2015 Dhaka North City Corporation mayor election.

He bagged 8,39,302 votes, up by 54,105 from 785,197 that Annisul and Tabith had secured altogether, according to a comparative study of the two election results.

Voter turnout in this mayoral by-election, however, was lower than last election. In the 2015 election, 37.3 per cent voters exercised their rights as against 30.05 per cent in Thursday’s by-poll.

A lower voter turnout was understood much before voting ended as fewer voters were seen coming to centres and casting their votes on the election day.

Rains as well as a boycott by major political parties, including BNP, the arch rival of the ruling Awami League, were blamed for the lower turnout.

Even Atiqul, after casting his own vote, had said the election would have been more participatory ‘ if another party (BNP) took part in it”.

In the early hours of the balloting, Chief Election Commissioner KM Nurul Huda, however, expected that the turnout would increase at the end of the day.

Explaining why the turnout was so low, he also said at the time that voters were not interested in voting because some major political parties had boycotted the election.

Election Commission secretary Helal Uddin Ahmed, at the end of the voting in the DNCC mayoral by-election and polls to councillor posts in 36 new wards, 18 under DNCC and as many under the Dhaka South City Corporation (DSCC), forecast a turnout of 50 per cent voters, overall.

The turnout, however, falls far short of the prediction as the Commission in the early hours of Friday, after counting all votes, announced that a total of 30.05 per cent votes were cast in the by-election.

A total of 942,539 people exercised their rights in the mayoral by-poll of DNCC – home to 3,035,599 voters.

In November 2017, the DNCC mayoral post fell vacant following the death of Annisul, who had been elected the mayor in April 2015.

In the election that followed a high-voltage campaign, Awami League-endorsed Annisul had got 460,117 votes and his closest rival BNP-supported Tabith, 325,080 votes.