The average voter turnout was around 17 percent during the first four hours of the second phase of the upazila parishad elections, Election Commission (EC) Secretary Jahangir Alam said this afternoon.

He was talking to reporters at the EC office.

According to data from 10,000 of the total 13,155 polling centres, the voter turnout was 16.94 percent, he said.

However, Jahangir Alam said he had expected a better turnout in the second phase of the sixth upazila parishad election being held in 156 upazilas across the country.

The voter turnout was 36 percent during the first phase of the upazila polls held on May 8.