Most of the lawmakers-elect of the Jatiya Party yesterday said the party should join the Awami League-led new government.

The opinion came at a joint meeting of JP presidium members and MPs-elect at the party chief's Banani office, JP Co-chairman GM Quader told reporters after the meeting.

The party's parliamentary body will decide its role in the 11th parliament.

“Our newly elected MPs will join the parliamentary party meeting tomorrow [today] after taking the oath,” Quader added.

Meanwhile, the oath-taking ceremony of MPs-elect will be held at the Jatiya Sangsad Bhaban today, said a parliament secretariat press release yesterday. 

At 11:00am, Speaker Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury will administer the oath.

At the briefing, Quader said, “The parliamentary party meeting will decide what will be the Jatiya Party's role in parliament, considering the interest of the country and the grand alliance."

He added that they would talk about the issue with the alliance after the meeting.

“We are in the grand alliance and contested the election with the alliance partners with identical goals. So, we'll finalise all the decisions through discussions."

The JP co-chairman, who presided over yesterday's meeting, said they discussed the country's political situation at the joint meeting.

Party Secretary General Moshiur Rahman Ranga said they would take some organisational steps to strengthen the party.

He added that parliamentary party members would sit with the AL-led grand alliance to determine the party's role in parliament.

JP Chairman HM Ershad and Senior Co-chairman Raushan Ershad were not present at the meeting.

On Tuesday, Moshiur said they would decide yesterday whether they would remain as the opposition or part of government in the House.

OFFICIAL POLLS RESULTS

In another development, the Election Commission yesterday in its official results said the AL bagged 257 seats and the JP 22 seats in Sunday's national election.

Chief Election Commissioner KM Nurul Huda at a post-election press conference on Monday and EC Secretary Helal Uddin Ahmed at the end of announcement of unofficial results of the polls said the AL won in 259 constituencies and the JP in 20.

EC officials said they made the mistake while preparing the list of all winning candidates hurriedly.

The commission yesterday published a gazette notification of all 298 winning candidates.

According to the official results of the December 30 polls, the AL-led grand alliance bagged 288 seats while the BNP-led Jatiya Oikyafront got seven.

Voting was suspended at three polling stations in Brahmanbaria-2 over violence. Voting in those centres will be held on January 9.

Election in Gaibandha-3 was rescheduled for January 27 after Oikyafront candidate TIM Fazley Rabbi died on December 20.

Around 60 new faces got BNP tickets for the December 30 parliamentary election and most of them are former student leaders and family members of veteran or deceased party leaders.

The BNP handed out nominations for 280 constituencies over the last two days. It picked some young female aspirants, including popular singer Kanak Chapa.

About a dozen people of religious and ethnic minorities received the party nomination.

“We tried to bring diversity in nominating candidates. We tried to give nomination to a good number of candidates of religious and ethnic minority communities as we had made commitments,” Moudud Ahmed, party's standing committee member, told The Daily Star yesterday.

Goyeshwar Chandra Roy, Nitai Roy Chowdhury, Goutam Chokroborty, Joyonto Kundu, Ramesh Datta, Tarun Dey, Sikriti Kumar Mondal, Jhon Gomej, Depan Dewan, Moni Swapan Dewan and Sachin Cru Jeri got the nominations.

The BNP wrapped up giving nomination letters to its aspirants last night but could not say how many letters were issued.

Its Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, however, claimed that they nominated 800 in 280 constituencies.

NEW FACES

More than two dozen former Jatiyatabadi Chhatra Dal and Jubo Dal leaders got BNP nominations for the first time.

Chhatra Dal President Rajib Ahsan, Vice-President Mamunuru Rashid Mamun, and Secretary Akram Hossain were among them.

Former Chhatra Dal leaders Amirul Islam Alim, Hasan Mamun, Taifur Islam Tipu, Rakibul Islam Bokul, Mia Nurruddin Ahmed Opu, Anisur Rahman Talukdar Khokon, Saiful Islam Firoz, Joyonto Kundu, Tarun Dey, Romesh Datta, and Farhad Hossain Azad also got party tickets.

BNP's youth wing Jubo Dal's Senior Vice-President Murtajul Karim Baadru and SM Jahangir were supposed to submit their nomination papers today. Former Jubo Dal leaders Saiful Alam Nirob, Nurul Islam Noyon, Abdul Kadir Bhuyian Jewel, and Mamun Hasan got the party's nomination letter for the first time.

Former lawmaker SA Khaleque's son SA Saju got nominated in his father's constituency. Former Dhaka City Corporation mayor Sadeque Hossain Khoka's son Ishraque Hossain also got picked.

CONTROVERSIAL ONES 

There were some controversial figures with BNP nominations.

Aminul Huq, Nadim Mustafa, and Mizanur Rahman Minu of Rajshahi; Alamgir Kabir of Naogaon; and Ruhul Kuddus Talukdar Dulu of Natore allegedly patronised militants in their areas during the 2001-06 tenure of the BNP-led alliance government.

These political leaders, then ministers or lawmakers, reportedly had links with Islamist militants in the region.

The party also nominated Faisal Alim, son of convicted war criminal Abdul Alim who has been sentenced to imprisonment until death for his offences committed during the Liberation War.

CELEBRITY RUNNERS

The BNP issued nomination letters to actors Helal Khan in Sylhet and Shayla Aktar in Faridpur.

Singer Baby Naznin, Kanak Chapa, and Monir Khan also got the party's blessing to run.

BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir today said this election has become a mockery.

The BNP leader made the comments to The Daily Star at the Syedpur Airport in Nilphamari when he was returning to Dhaka from Thakurgaon after voting ended today at 4:00pm.

Ruling party men and police worked hand in hand during this election, Fakhrul said.

“This is the death of democracy,” he further added.

The first three hours were peaceful, even festive at times as people came in to cast their vote at the polling centres in the Lalmonirhat 3 constituency since early morning.

The presence of female voters was notable, all queuing up in front of polling centres around sadar upazila waiting for their turn.

Polling agents of BNP and Jatiya Party candidates Asadul Habib Dulu and Golam Mohammed Quader respectively were there.

But the scenario started changing radically from 11:00am as Awami League (AL) activists began to arrive. They started calling out to voters, telling them to leave while forcing out BNP agents. No BNP worker or leader returned fearing attacks.

In some centres even police carried out such acts, snatching voter lists from BNP agents.

A correspondent of The Daily Star was present in a polling centre set up inside Lalmonirhat Government High School.

The presiding officer there, Rakibuzzaman, had locked himself inside a classroom after suspending voting around 12:30pm while some 300-400 AL men clamoured inside the school.

A judicial magistrate arrived half an hour later and coaxed him out. A visibly shaken Rakibuzzaman informed that the voting boxes, stamps and ballot papers had been taken away by the AL men. The judicial magistrate then left.

“Voting has been suspended in consultation with the UNO (upazila nirbahi officer) as the situation here was tense,” Rakibuzzaman replied on request for a comment.

On what happened to the voting materials, he abruptly turned around and again locked himself inside the classroom.

By 1:00pm the scenario had turned grim in most of the upazila's 89 polling centres: either voting was suspended or they were occupied by the AL men.

A correspondent of The Daily Star witnessed a local AL leader, Sumon Khan, and his men take over the Khochabari Primary School centre around 11:00am. They forced all others out within half an hour.

Villagers of Kulaghat came rushing to the correspondent during a visit to inform that AL men wielding sticks had chased them away from a voting centre in the local high school. They said normalcy returned when the army arrived.

Villagers of Shakoa staged agitations on a road after police created panic by chasing away voters, some even to their doorsteps, from the Shakoa Taj Mahmud High School centre.

BNP's Rajpur union publication secretary, Tojammel Haque, 62, died in Rangpur Medical College Hospital around 2:00pm on suffering injuries during a clash between AL and BNP men at Paglarhat Government Primary School in the initial hours.

Voting at the centre was suspended for some time.

A group of foreign and local election observers, who monitored the December 30 parliamentary election, has termed the election free, fair, peaceful and on a par with major democratic countries in the world.

The foreign observers from Canada, India, Nepal and Sri Lanka, who came to Bangladesh at the invitation of  Election Monitoring Forum (EMF) and SAARC Human Rights Foundation (SHRF), also said the just concluded election was “much better” than past elections in Bangladesh and could be a “glowing example for other democratic countries”.

The foreign observers were speaking at a press conference held at Jatiya Press Club yesterday to share what they have seen during their daylong visit to nine polling centres in the capital on Sunday.

“This was a world standard election…We can compare this with the elections of major democratic countries,” said former president of Kolkata Press Club, Kamal Bhattacharya.

The senior journalist told Bangladeshi media that he had covered two past elections in Bangladesh as a reporter, and this time he came as an observer.

“I talked to a number of voters standing in queues and inside polling centres and no one told me they faced any threat, harassment or intimidation,” he said.

He said voters had trust and confidence in the Election Commission and authorities concerned that they would follow the best practices in the election; the arrangements helped voters to cast their votes smoothly and with safety.

Another observer from Nepal, Advocate Mohamadin Ali, said Bangladesh has set the best example of a high standard election.

Former minister and member of Nepal Communist Party, Hakikullah Musalman, said he was immensely impressed to see such a peaceful, disciplined and orderly election in Bangladesh.

Speaking at the press conference, Prof Mohammed Abed Ali, executive director of Election Monitoring Forum, informed that the forum is an association of 31 organisations and 26 NGOs registered under the Election Commission.

He said they deployed 5,765 observers in 214 constituencies out of 299, who visited 17,165 centres. Abed Ali said it was a peaceful election and it was far better than previous ones.

Director General of External Publicity Wing of the Foreign Ministry, Mohammad Sarwar Mahmood; Canadian observers Tania Dawn Foster and Chally Foster; Nepalese Communist Party member and former MP Nazir Mia; lawyer of Kolkata Judge Court Gautom Ghosh; writer and researcher from Sri Lanka Mohammed Ehsan Iqbal; and SAARC Human Rights Foundation's director Masum Chowdhury were also present at the press conference.