64,000 EC officials to conduct local body polls

The Election Commission has enlisted some 64,000 election officials, including presiding officers, assistant presiding officers and polling officers, for conducting the December 30 municipal polls.

The commission will start training up the election officials after publishing the final list soon.

“The training for trainers has already started,” EC Secretary Sirazul Islam told the news agency yesterday.

According to the EC secretariat, the commission enlisted an additional five percent officials so that it can remove oficials against whom complaints might be filed centring bias and controversy.

The number of election officials has been finalised at a recent meeting of the Election Commission.

The commission will require 3,582 presiding officers for the same number of polling stations for conducting the election in 234 municipalities.

Besides, it will need 19,187 assistant presiding officers and 38,374 polling officers for 19,187 booths of the polling stations.

According to statistics provided by the commission, 12,045 candidates -- 923 mayoral, 8,589 general councillor and 2,533 women councillor contenders in reserved seats -- are contesting the polls.