United Nations Radio

The United Nations has welcomed the success of the "peaceful" parliamentary elections in Bangladesh this week.

ballot box

Francesc Vendrell, who heads the Secretary-General's panel for the parliamentary elections, has met with incoming Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina of the Awami League, which won Monday's vote by a landslide. For more in the UN's role in Bangladesh's first parliamentary elections in seven years. I spoke to Najia Hashemee, a programme specialist with the UN Development Programme.

NAJIA: UNDP here in Bangladesh has been assisting the election commission since 1996. And over the past several months, UNDP has supported the commission in preparing and conducting for the December 29th election. Primarily, UNDP has supported the creation of a photographic voter list which is the first in Bangladesh. The list is a highly accurate and inclusive voter list, and it is one of the best Bangladesh has ever had. In addition to that voter list project, UNDP also assisted the commission in upgrading its website so the commission was able to disclose all the candidates' information on the website; was able to post the voter list on the website. And as well as the ICT infrastructure, help the commission receive election results on election day from across the country in a more efficient and with a higher degree of accuracy than in the past.

DIANNE: Why was it so important for UNDP to assist with this photographic voter list and helping upgrade the computer infrastructure?

NAJIA: Well the previous voter list was much debated, and it's one of the reasons why the Awami League boycotted the elections scheduled for early 2007. The election commission that came into power following those cancellations approached the international community for support in preparing a new voter list, and the international community then requested UNDP to administer and provide the technical assistance for this project. And the list was created in a record time of just 11 months, registering over 80 million people across the country, requiring travel through rural-urban areas, remote areas of the country. And because of the importance of the voter list to the electoral process, and as part of the assurance role, UNDP commissioned an independent audit of the list. And the audit has confirmed the accuracy and excellent rating of the voter list, which enjoys around 99 per cent confidence level.

DIANNE: Was there also sort of like voter education, telling people about the list and things like that?

NAJIA: Yes. UNDP supported the commission in doing a nation-wide public awareness initiative on the voter list, as well as on election day procedures. The commission prepared videos that were telecast on various channels, including the last few days leading up to the election: they did newspaper advertisements. The chief elections commissioner went on television every Saturday before the elections to answer the public's questions. And in all these efforts UNDP was able to provide the training to ensure that those public awareness were on target and was able to provide the information that the voters needed to get out on election day.

DIANNE: Is there anything further you would like our listeners to know about UNDP's work there?

NAJIA: UNDP will continue to work with the election commission. Local elections are upcoming in just a few weeks, so the commission doesn't have a lot of time to just sit back and relax after these elections. They'll have to prepare for the elections, take some of the lessons learned from this election. So UNDP will continue to provide training, capacity building efforts, initiatives to help this commission to ensure that what they have begun and the successes they have achieved are sustainable in the coming years.

PRES: Najia Hashemee is a programme specialist with the UN Development Programme in Bangladesh.

Producer: Dianne Penn

Duration: 3'58"