Election Commissioner Brig Gen (Retd) Abdul Fazal Md Sanaullah has said that if the expatriates` expectations are to be fulfilled in the next national elections, they will have to go for proxy voting.

He came up with the information during a press briefing at Agargaon on Tuesday.

Proxy voting is currently common in some countries.

Md Sanaullah said "We will sit with relevant experts, including Dhaka University and BUET, on April 7 or 8 and seek their opinions. A decision will be made based on the opinions of political parties."

The committee examined three balloting systems for expatriates – postal balloting system, online balloting system and proxy balloting system.

About the postal system, he said, their (committee’s) finding is that the postal system is currently a dysfunctional system for expatriates. “That is why not a single vote was cast by an expatriate in the last 12th parliamentary elections. A total of 433 votes were cast from the people within Bangladesh,” he added.

About the online voting system, the Election Commissioner said online voting has not become very popular in different countries like the United States, the Philippines, Estonia and Mexico. “Besides, in our subcontinent, India, Pakistan and a few countries are piloting online systems.”

But during a discussion, the UNDP said many people could not succeed with this online system and finally returned to their previous system.

Talking about the proxy voting system, Sanaullah said the proxy balloting system is practiced in various countries, including Australia and England. In India, it is practiced only for the members of the armed forces, he said.