EC formation soon as search panel submits nominations to president

President Abdul Hamid will soon form the Election Commission (EC) after reviewing the candidates proposed by the search committee mandated to propose nominations for the posts of chief and other election commissioners, officials said on Thursday.

The EC search committee handed over the final list of 10 candidates to the president in a meeting at the Bangabhaban in the evening, marking the end of its task, Cabinet Secretary Khandaker Anwarul Islam told reporters.

He added that the president will now 'examine' the list and soon issue a directive on EC formation and following which a notification will be published within a day or two.   

Asked if the names of the candidates will be published, the secretary said, "Names of the five people selected by the president [to form the EC] will be in the notification." 

Meanwhile, the Bangabhaban's press wing said in a statement that the president thanked the search committee members for their tireless efforts.

He hoped it would be possible to form a strong and acceptable election commission based on the committee's recommendations that would be able to conduct free and fair national and local elections in future, the statement added.

Among members of the committee, all except its head Justice Obaidul Hassan, who headed the committee, attended the meeting.

"He [Justice Obaidul] could not attend the meeting as he fell sick," said the cabinet secretary.

However, other members— Justice SM Quddus Zaman, former election commissioner Muhammad Sohul Hossain, writer-professor Anwara Syed Haque, Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) Muslim Chowdhury and Public Service Commission (PSC) Chairman Sohrab Hossain— were present during the handover of the list.

This is the first time that an election commission is going to be formed through a search committee under the EC formation law, passed in the parliament on 27 January.

The nominations were finalised by shortlisting 320 candidates in seven separate meetings of the search panel. The committee also held four meetings with eminent citizens and journalists, many of whom repeatedly called for making the list public.

Later the panel published the initial list of 322 candidates but refrained from publishing the final picks, saying it did not have the legal authority to do so.