A Commonwealth pre-election assessment mission on Sunday met the Election Commission to know the preparations for the 13th parliamentary election to be held in early February.

A five-member Commonwealth delegation, led by its electoral support section’s (ESS) head Linford Andrews, sat with the Chief Election Commissioner AMM Nasir Uddin and four election commissioners at Nirbachan Bhaban in the city.

Talking to reporters after the meeting, Linford Andrews said they are here in Bangladesh with a number of objectives in mind, including ascertaining whether there will be broad support among all stakeholders in Bangladesh for the presence of a common observer mission during the next election.

“We are here with a number of objectives in mind. The first objective is for us to ascertain whether there will be broad support among all stakeholders in Bangladesh for the presence of a common observer mission. We are also here to assess the prevailing environment as well as the preparations for the election,” he said.

He said it is customary when the Commonwealth is due to be invited to observe a Commonwealth member country's election; the Commonwealth Secretary General deploys a pre-election assessment mission to the member country.

“I must thank both the interim administration for kindly facilitating all the appointments for us as well as the chief election commissioner, fellow commissioners and the senior secretary for kindly briefing us on their preparations for the upcoming elections,” said Linford Andrews.

He said it is their first day in the country and they would be here until Friday (October 31). In the coming days we will be meeting a range of stakeholders including political parties, civil society, international donor and diplomatic community as well as media, he added.

He said the Commonwealth has very strong long-standing historical links with Bangladesh. The Commonwealth was the first organization which Bangladesh joined after independence in the early 1970s and ever since then the Commonwealth has an abiding interest in supporting the people of Bangladesh.

“Our presence here is testimony to that interest and our enthusiasm to support the people of Bangladesh through this very crucial upcoming election. In all Commonwealth member countries, we always say democracy is a journey and the Commonwealth looks forward to partnership with Bangladesh and the international community in supporting Bangladesh in the weeks and months ahead, not just for the elections but also looking beyond the elections to the post-election phase when we would also be looking very keenly at how we can support Bangladesh in the next governance cycle,” said Linford Andrews.

Four other ‎ Commonwealth delegation members are its Asian chapter Dr Dinusha Panditaratne, legal adviser Nancy Kanyago, ‎assistant research officer Sarthak Roy and ESS executive officer Madonna Lynch. EC senior secretary Akhtar Ahmed was present at the meeting.