The Election Commission (EC) Secretariat has published the final voter list comprising 349 Members of Parliament for the 23rd Presidential Election of Bangladesh. The official gazette notification was issued on Thursday evening (August 6) by the EC Secretary. Earlier in the day, the commission officially announced the schedule for the presidential election. According to the declared schedule, voting will take place in the Jatiya Sangsad chamber on August 20 from 2:00 PM to 5:00 PM.
By law, all 350 Members of Parliament—comprising 300 general constituency seats and 50 reserved women seats—are eligible to vote in the presidential election. However, the voter count for this election stands at 349.
The swearing-in of the winning candidate in the Chattogram-4 constituency was initially stayed by court order. Subsequently, on June 30, the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court disqualified his candidacy due to loan default status. As a result, the seat remains vacant with no sitting Member of Parliament, leading the EC to issue the final voter list with 349 members.
Possibility of Uncontested Victory
Typically, if the ruling party fields a single candidate for the presidency and no competing nominations are submitted, the candidate is declared elected unopposed without requiring a vote.
Political analysts and election officials note that considering the timeline for nomination verification and withdrawals, if there are no rival candidates, the country may have its new president declared as early as August 16 on the day of nomination scrutiny.
