The New Nation - Internet Edition

UNB, Dhaka

The election-monitoring organizations must get registered with the Election Commission for accreditation to observe the upcoming elections, EC secretary M Humayun Kabir said yesterday, as they prepared for calling the next polls.

"The EC has formulated a draft policy about the domestic election observers," he told a press briefing at the EC secretariat in the afternoon.

The EC secretary said the registration of the election observers would be accredited to the commission for one year and they would be able to monitor any election during the term with their accreditation.

He said according to the new policy an election observer would have educational qualification of at least SSC and must be above 25 years of age. "They will be allowed to stay during the ballot counting," he said.

Replying to a question, Humayun Kabir said the commission already had a different policy for the foreign election observers and that also might be amended as per the new domestic observer policy.

He said all the organizations should be individually registered with the EC and two organizations would be allowed to monitor the polls in every upazila area. "In such a way the organizations of election observers will be evenly distributed," he said.

The EC secretary said at least one observer must have to stay in every polling center but maximum one observer would be allowed to stay in each booth.

Replying to a question, he said the circulation for the election observers' registration would be published after finalizing the observation policy within the middle of October.