COX'S BAZAR, Dec 23: Ahead of the 13th national election, nine candidates have collected nomination papers to contest four constituencies in Cox's Bazar District.
Among them, four are from the BNP, four from the Islami Shasontantra Andolan (ISA), and one is an independent candidate.
Md. Abdul Mannan, Deputy Commissioner and District Returning Officer of Cox's Bazar, said the nomination papers were collected from the day following the official announcement of the election schedule on December 11 until 3 pm on Monday.
He added that the process of collecting nomination papers has been ongoing since the announcement. Candidates can obtain papers from the office of the District Returning Officer as well as from the Assistant Returning Officers at the upazila level (UNO offices). As of 3 pm on Monday, a total of nine candidates, including party-affiliated and independent contenders, had collected nomination papers.
From Cox's Bazar-1 (Chakaria-Pekua), the papers were collected by Salahuddin Ahmed (BNP), Sarwar Alam Kutubi (ISA), and Saiful Islam (Independent). From Cox's Bazar-2 (Maheshkhali-Kutubdia), Ziaul Haque (ISA) collected papers. From Cox's Bazar-3 (Sadar, Ramu, Eidgaon), Lutfur Rahman Kajol (BNP) and Amirul Islam (ISA) collected papers. From Cox's Bazar-4 (Ukhiya-Teknaf), Shahjahan Chowdhury (BNP), Mohammad Abdullah (BNP), and Nurul Haque (ISA) obtained their nomination papers.
Although Shahjahan Chowdhury was announced as the BNP candidate for Cox's Bazar-4, supporters of district BNP leader Mohammad Abdullah had been protesting, demanding his nomination. On Sunday, Abdullah's supporters collected his nomination papers from the District Returning Officer's office.
