Bangladesh to use electronic voting system for next elections

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina today reiterated her government’s plans to introduce electronic voting system in the country to hold free, fair and neutral elections in future.
The electronic voting system was successfully used in the mayoral elections in Chittagong City mayoral election on Jun 17, 2009, but the Election Commission is yet to seek opinions of all parties for introducing the system in general elections.
According to Hasina, “The Election Commission will be strengthened to return the people’s power to the people. They will decide as to whom they’ll hand over the reins of power.”
The prime minister also noted that most of the South Asian countries use e-voting system in elections.
During the Election Commission’s dialogue with political parties on digitalizing the electoral mechanism a party secretary said, “We strongly favour the introduction of EVM (electronic voting machine) as Bangladesh needs to keep up with the pace of the modern technology and development.” The commission has unanimously decided to consult the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET) and seek technical assistance of Bangladesh Machine Tools Factory (BMTC) for introducing the system in large scale.

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