Sheikh Hasina Wins Record Fifth Term in Bangladesh Elections

Bangladesh’s Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina was reelected for a fifth term Sunday in the general elections. Several opposition parties led by the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) boycotted these elections.

Out of the 264 seats of the total 300 announced, Hasina’s Awami League won 204 and her allied Jatiya Party got nine more, reported Somoy TV.

Ruling Awami League “has won more than 50 per cent seats,” an Election Commission spokesman told AFP.

Hasina’s Awami League faced no major opposition in any of the seats as no major opposition party contested in the polls. The opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), whose most key leaders were arrested, called it a “sham election”.

Shakib Al Hasan, the Bangladesh cricket team captain, won as an Awami League candidate.

Begum Khaleda Zia, 78, of BNP was convicted of graft in 2018 and is now in ailing health at a hospital in Dhaka. BNP head Rahman is her son.