Two major parties ignore women

They talk about women empowerment quite often, but the two major political parties picked only a few women for mayoral posts.

Out of 234 mayor posts in as many municipalities, the ruling Awami League nominated only seven women while its archrival BNP picked just one for the December 30 polls, according to the lists of candidates.

However, Jatiya Party (JP), Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal, and Workers Party did not pick a single woman for mayor posts. The three parties fielded mayor candidates in over 93, 26 and nine municipalities respectively, said their leaders.

The AL, BNP and JP nominated 564 mayor hopefuls, while 17 other parties gave tickets to 147 aspirants.

As many as 1,223 mayor candidates filed nominations to contest the municipality elections. Of them, 711 will take part in the polls on party tickets while the rest as independents.

For the first time in the country's history, the municipality polls are going to be held on partisan lines.

Although 2,661 women filed nominations to vie for 733 reserved posts of councillors, only around 20 did so for mayoral posts, According to Election Commission statistics.

The AL's nominees for mayoral posts are Jakia Khatun in Panchagarh, Thamina Akhtar in Thakurgaon, Nargis Khatun in Charghat of Rajshahi, Roksana Mortaja Lily in Gopalpur of Natore, Asanur Biswas in Belkuchi of Sirajganj and Hasina Gazi in Tarabo of Narsingdi.

BNP nominated Shahnaj Akhter for mayor in Laksam Municipality of Comilla. She is the wife of municipality BNP President Humayun Kabir Parvez who has been missing for nearly one year.

A total of 20 political parties registered with the EC are contesting the municipality polls. Of them, seven small parties fielded one mayor candidate each, but none of them were women.

The seven parties are Bikalpa Dhara Bangladesh, Revolutionary Workers Party of Bangladesh, Bangladesher Samajtantrik Dal, Tarikat Federation, Bangladesh Nationalist Front, Pragatishil Gonotantrik Dal and Bangladesh National Awami Party (Bangladesh-NAP).

Following reforms in the electoral law in 2008, all registered political parties included a provision in their charters stating that they would have 33 percent women leaders in all their party committees by 2020. The move was aimed at empowering women politically.   

Talking to The Daily Star, AL presidium member Nooh-ul-Alam Lenin said, "During the selection process, we assessed popularity and competence of our mayor hopefuls as ensuring victory for the party candidates is our main target. Therefore, we didn't consider the gender issue."

AL Organising Secretary Khalid Mahmood Chowdhury claimed that they didn't discriminate between men and women while picking candidates. "We've nominated our party men who have the best chances of winning."

BNP acting secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir said women leaders were not interested in contesting the polls as the country's political situation is "different" now.

"Given the present political situation, the party's women leaders didn't dare to take part in the mayoral polls," he added.

General secretaries of Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal and Workers Party Sharif Nurul Ambia and Fazle Hossain Badsha said they did not pick enough women for mayoral posts as they received poor response from them.

Educationalist Rasheda K Chowdhury said most of the political parties talk about women empowerment, but they act in contrary to what they say.

"It's surprising that even the left-leaning parties, who are more vocal in women empowerment, didn't pick a single woman for mayor," added the former adviser to a caretaker government.

"It's true that we won't be able to change the present situation overnight due to our socio-economic condition. But the political leaders are yet to start the process to bring a change," she observed.

Local government expert Tofail Ahmed said women didn't emerge as public leaders in many areas. 

"Females don't want to come out from the comfort zone of contesting for the posts of reserved councillors," he added.

Sultana Kamal, executive director of Ain O Salish Kendra (ASK), said it was unfortunate that political parties did not properly evaluate women while picking their mayor candidates, although they talk a lot about women empowerment.

"I don't believe that there is a shortage of competent and qualified women in political parties to run for mayor," she observed.

Meanwhile, women's rights organisations and many candidates yesterday criticised the EC's allocation of "humiliating" electoral symbols to women councilor candidates.

The symbols include gas stove, bangle, chocolate, doll, frock, scissors, handbag, bee, grape and harmonium.

Blasting the EC's decision, Rights body ASK in a statement said women were not born to do the household chores.

Bangladesh Mahila Parishad's Gaibandha unit submitted a memorandum to the district administration, asking it to change the symbols.

This was not the first time that the EC allocated such symbols for women candidates. These symbols were also used in the city corporation polls in Dhaka and Chittagong in April. 

Amid criticism, the EC at the time said it would consider the issue next time. But it failed to meet its commitment, ASK said in the statement.

It hoped that the EC and the government would take measures to allocate new symbols to women candidates.

However, defending the EC's decision, EC Commissioner M Shah Nawaz said the symbols would only introduce the candidates to the voters.

The commission had to change electoral rules to comply with the new law on the municipality polls. "We didn't have enough time to discuss allocation of symbols … those symbols were allocated hurriedly," he told reporters at the EC Secretariat.

The EC will be more careful about choosing symbols in future, he added.

SCRUTINY COMPLETED

EC officials said they cancelled nominations of 154 mayor aspirants out of 1,223 on Saturday and Sunday.

Besides, nominations of 572 general councilor aspirants out 9,798 and 156 reserved women councillors out of 2,668 were declared illegal.

'STOP PROJECT APPROVAL'

The EC yesterday sent letters to the planning ministry asking it not to approve any development projects for the municipalities going to polls.

If any development projects were approved now, it might influence the polls, EC Deputy Secretary Shamsul Alam told this newspaper last night.

The commission on December 1 sent similar letters to the ministries of disaster management and relief, food, LGRD, and women and children affairs.