Expatriate voting through app: Expansion of rights or invitation for dispute?

Illustration: TBS

The Election Commission has finally decided to introduce postal ballots for Bangladeshi expatriates in the 2026 general election. 

The decision promises to extend voting rights to a long-neglected constituency that makes up around 7.5% of the country's population and 10% of its voters. Furthermore, they played a significant role during the July Uprising by refusing to send in remittance when the AL regime was trying to brutally quell protests. 

Although provisions for expatriate voting have existed in electoral law since 2008, no mechanism had ever been put into effect. The Postal Vote BD app, expected to be launched in the third week of November this year, hopes to change that. 

But challenges remain, among the biggest of which are maintaining voter secrecy and managing ballots that cannot be retrieved once dispatched.

"Once election symbols are allocated, around 20–21 days remain before polling. After printing, it takes 10–12 days for ballots to reach returning officers, leaving only 7–10 days," Election Commissioner Abul Fazal Md Sanaullah said on 24 September during an online discussion. 

"For expatriates, it was impossible to send and return ballots within such a short timeframe, which is why not a single overseas vote has been cast to date," he added.

The risk is very high here, because in a sense it is a black box; just like the EVM, everything happens invisibly. So, if the expat voter turnout is high and people do not have enough confidence in the process, the losing parties will inevitably question the expat votes.

Badiul Alam Majumder, head, Electoral Reform Commission

Keeping this constraint in mind, the current commission has worked out an alternative. "We have changed the format of the ballot and are introducing a hybrid solution," he said.

Globally, postal ballot wastage stands at 24%; one in every four ballots never makes it back. Sometimes ballots are not delivered to the given address; sometimes voters simply fail to return them in time, rendering them invalid.

Badiul Alam Majumder, head of the Electoral Reform Commission, said, "Expatriate votes could taint the whole election unless necessary steps are taken. The risk is very high here, because in a sense it is a black box; just like the EVM, everything happens invisibly. So, if the expat voter turnout is high and the people do not have enough confidence in the process, the losing parties will inevitably question the expat votes."

Indeed, when forming a government is at stake, rival parties may very well outright reject the postal ballot results and claim voting fraud.

In fact, even the US, which has had voting by mail since its 1861-1865 Civil War, saw Donald Trump accusing fraud in postal ballots in the 2020 Election, when the mail-in voters played a crucial role in securing victory for Joe Biden.

Commissioner Sanaullah also acknowledged it, "The two main challenges are secrecy and validity," he said. "Voters must be able to cast their ballots freely and in private, without influence, and return them on time." He said that voters will also be required to sign an undertaking to that effect.

Another difficulty is that if a candidate list changes at the last minute due to a court order, all ballots already sent from abroad in that constituency will be invalidated, as they cannot be updated.

The digital layer adds another frontier of risk. 

In Bangladesh's case, expatriates are to register and track their ballots through an app requiring biometric verification and one-time passcodes. While intended to prevent fraud, this introduces its own vulnerabilities: compromised devices, intercepted codes, and sophisticated methods of bypassing facial recognition.

The two main challenges are secrecy and validity. Voters must be able to cast their ballots freely and in private, without influence, and return them on time… voters will also be required to sign an undertaking to that effect.

Abul Fazal Md Sanaullah, Election Commissioner

Cybersecurity experts have long warned that the further the voting process shifts from physical oversight, the greater the exposure to disruption, whether through technical failure or deliberate attack.

Even without malice, complexity alone may discourage participation. The proposed procedure involves multiple steps: digital registration, QR-code confirmation, careful handling of security stickers, and postal return.

Each step introduces the possibility of error; an envelope misplaced, a code not scanned, a declaration unsigned. For many expatriates juggling irregular work hours and limited access to reliable post, the hurdles may simply prove too high.

There is another problem — low voter turnout. 

In India, despite a diaspora of nearly 40 million, no more than 120,000 overseas citizens have ever registered to vote, and in one election, only 2,900 ballots were returned. 

Malaysia, with 1.8 million eligible overseas voters, saw just a peak registration of 54,000.

In Britain, despite longstanding postal provisions, studies show that overseas turnout rarely exceeds 20%. 

In Australia, officials regularly warn that thousands of postal ballots are invalidated due to late arrival or improper completion. The US, with one of the most extensive absentee ballot systems, saw nearly 1.2 million requested overseas ballots in 2020 — but the turnout was a mere 7.8%.

In fact, globally, only 2.7% of eligible expatriates register, and among them, fewer than 30% actually cast their votes.

"Among the 2.7% registered, the turnout rate in countries like Bangladesh is less than 30% — that is the reality," Commissioner Sanaullah remarked in that online discussion, "But we believe Bangladeshi expatriates show more interest in voting than many others. We must start somewhere, even at a limited scale. We will not fail, and gradually everyone will become engaged."

Badiul Alam Majumdar is also hopeful about the turnout.

"I believe we will see a much higher turnout in our expat voters. They have played a great role in ousting the Hasina regime, and therefore, they are eager to contribute to the voting process."

Another problem is that rival party branches abroad may mobilise their supporters aggressively, not only to influence registration and turnout but also to demonstrate political clout. Given that Bangladeshi migrants in the UK, US, Middle East, and Europe already replicate domestic rivalries, the extension of voting rights without a robust, neutral mechanism could lead to further conflict.

Moreover, in most Middle Eastern countries, migrant workers engaging in any kind of political activity lead to visa revocation and deportation. That risk persists.

"It can very well happen," said Badiul, "from what happened in the recent weeks in New York, the fear that our migrant workers may engage in active political campaigns or end up clashing is not overblown at all. We are quite politically charged at the moment; our expatriates are not an exception to it."