Awami League nominated mayoral candidates won both the Barishal City Corporation (BCC) and Khulna City Corporation (KCC) elections held on Monday.
Ruling party candidate Abul Khair Abdullah alias Khokan Serniabat won the BCC mayoral election by defeating his nearest candidate Islami Andolan nominated candidate Mufti Syed Mohammad Faizul Karim, who is also the chief of Islami Andolan.
Besides, ruling Awami League nominated candidate Talukder Abdul Khaleque won the KCC mayoral election by defeating his nearest candidate Moulana Abdul Awal of Islami Andolan.
Both the elections to BCC and KCC were held in a free and fair manner. No untoward incidents were reported.
Votes were cast through the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) amid the surveillance of the law-enforcers from various agencies. Besides, personnel from the Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) were also on patrol duties.
The entire voting process was monitored through the CCTV cameras.
In Barishal, ruling Awami League backed mayoral candidate Abul Khair Abdullah won the election by defeating his nearest candidate Mufti Syed Mohammad Faizul Karim, who is also the chief of Islami Andolan, with a huge difference of 53,407 votes.
The Election Commission (EC) officials declared Abul Khair Abdullah alias Khokan Serniabat unofficially as the BCC mayor after the counting of votes Monday evening.
According to the EC officials, ruling party candidates got a total of 87,752 votes in the symbol of ‘Boat’, while his nearest candidate Mufti Syed Mohammad Faizul Karim of Islami Andola got only 34,345 votes in ‘Hand Fan’ symbol.
The voting in 126 centres of the BCC was started at 8:00am and ended at 4:00pm. At the end of counting of votes in all the 126 polling centres, the returning officers announced the result at around 7:00pm.
The number total votes in the BCC was 2,76,294.
It should be mentioned that Abul Khair Abdullah alias Khokon Serniabat won the BCC mayoral election despite the incumbent BCC mayor Sadiq Abdullah, who also the general secretary of Barishal city unit Awami League and a son of Barisal-1 (Gournadi and Agailjhara) Constituency lawmaker Abul Hasnat Abdullah.
According to sources, Sadiq Abdullah even did not cast his vote in the BCC election as part of his rivalry with the party’s mayoral candidate. He had been staying outside the Barishal city since the campaign started on 26 May and did not return on the polling day on Monday.
Moreover, Sadiq Abdullah allegedly had worked against AL nominated candidate and patronised Islami Andolan backed mayoral candidate Mufti Foyzul Karim.
A total of seven mayor candidates contested for the BCC election. Of them, four candidates were from different political parties. They are AL backed Abul Khair Abdullah alias Khokon Sherniabat, Islami Andolon Bangladesh backed Mufti Syed Mohammad Faizul Karim, Jatiya Party backed Engineer Iqbal Hossain Taposh and Zaker Party backed Md Mizanur Rahman Bachhu.
Besides, three other independents were Md Kamrul Hassan Rupon, Md Ali Hossain Hawlader and Asaduzzaman.
Meanwhile in Khulna, ruling Awami League nominated candidate Talukder Abdul Khaleque won the KCC mayoral election by defeating his nearest candidate Moulana Abdul Awal of Islami Andolan with a difference of 000 votes.
AL candidate Talukder Abdul Khaleque got 0000 votes in the symbol of ‘Boat’ while his nearest candidate Moulana Abdul Awal of Islami Andolan got 000 votes in the symbol of ‘Hamd Fan’.
The voting in 289 polling centres of the KCC was started at 8:00am and ended at 4:00pm.
At the end of voting, returning officer Alauddin started announcing of the election results in the hall of Khulna District Art Academy from Monday afternoon.
In the KCC polls, five candidates vied for the mayoral post. They were AL-backed Talukder Abdul Khaleque (boat), Jatiya Party's Shafiqul Islam Modhu (plough), Bangladesh Islami Andolon's Moulana Abdul Awal (hand Fan), Zaker Party's SM Sabbir Hossain (rose) and independent candidate Shafiqur Rahman Mushfiq (table clock).
Besides, there were 136 candidates for councillors in 29 general wards, and 30 for reserved seats. Two councillors for wards 13 and 24 were elected unopposed earlier.
There are 5,35,528 voters in 31 wards of Khulna city and voters cast their votes in 1,732 polling booths under 289 polling centres.
