Bangladesh’s registered voter count has risen to 12.88 crore after 4,54,403 new voters were added to the electoral roll ahead of the local government elections.
Election Commission Secretary Akhtar Ahmed disclosed the figure on Monday while announcing the final updated voter list.
Briefing reporters at the Election Commission building, he said the country now has 12,87,77,643 registered voters.
Of them, 6,55,10,665 are male voters, 6,32,65,711 are female voters and 1,267 are transgender voters.
“With this voter list, we will move forward with the local government elections,” Akhtar said.
He said those who were enrolled as voters by 31 July would be eligible to vote in the upcoming elections.
The secretary also said the probable list of polling centres has already been finalised.
The Election Commission is preparing to hold elections at all five tiers of local government.
Polls are expected for various posts in 13 city corporations, 330 municipalities, around 500 upazilas, 61 district councils and more than 4,500 union parishads.
According to the EC’s preliminary plan, the election process is likely to begin with Union Parishad polls.
Chief Election Commissioner AMM Nasir Uddin said last Thursday that elections are generally held around two months after the schedule is announced.
“If we announce the schedule in September or October, the election will move into next year. If the election is held next year, we will have to announce the schedule this year,” he said.
The CEC said he hoped the election schedule could be announced in September.
He added that some local government elections could be held towards the end of this year, while others may be held next year.
