Bangladesh PM Hasina secures fourth straight term as expected

Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina swept to a fourth straight term as expected with her party winning an absolute majority in the general election, the poll body said on Monday, amid low turnout in the vote boycotted by the main opposition.

The main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), who participated in the 2018 vote but kept away in 2014, boycotted the polls after Hasina refused their demands to resign and allow a neutral authority to run the general election, Reuters reported.

The daughter of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, founding father of Bangladesh who was killed in an army coup in 1975 along with most members of the family, Hasina, 76, first became prime minister in 1996. This will be her fifth term overall.

In her past 15 years in power she has been credited with turning around the economy and the massive garments industry, while winning international praise for sheltering Rohingya Muslims fleeing persecution in neighboring Myanmar.

Bangladeshis largely stayed away from Sunday’s election, which was marred by violence. Turnout was about 40% when polls closed, said chief election commissioner Kazi Habibul Awal, compared with over 80% in the last election in 2018.