Dhaka: Bangladesh will celebrate elections in early April 2026 for the first time since a massive lifting overthrew the government last year, the interim leader Muhammad Yunus said on Friday.
The South Asia Nation of around 170 million people has been in political agitation since former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina was expelled for a revolt led by students in August 2024, finishing its 15 -year rule with iron cysts.
“I am announcing to the citizens of the country that the elections will be held any day in the first half of April 2026,” said Yunus, the 84 -year -old Nobel Peace Prize winner who directs the caregiver’s government.
The political parties that complain of power have repeatedly demanded that Yunus fix an electoral schedule, while he has said that time is needed since the country requires a review of its democratic institutions after the Hasina mandate.
The interim leader Yunus says that the main responsibility of his government is to guarantee the ‘transparent and participatory election’
“The Government has been doing everything necessary to create an environment conducive to celebrating the elections,” he said in the television broadcast, while repeating his warning that reforms were needed.
“It should be remembered that Bangladesh has become a deep crisis every time he has had a defective choice,” he said, in a speech given on the eve of Eidul Azha’s holidays.
“A political party usurped power through such elections in the past, and became a fascist Bárbara force.” The Hasina government saw generalized abuses in human rights, and its government was accused of politicizing courts and civil service, as well as organizing unpleasant elections.
The interim government had already repeatedly promised to hold elections before June 2026, but said that the longer it had to promulgate reforms, the better.
Very important reform
The Key Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), seen as the favorite of the election, in recent weeks has been pressing so that surveys are celebrated in December.
The army chief general, Waker-Uz-Zaman, in a speech to the officers in May, also said that the elections should be held in December, according to Bangladesh media and military sources.
Days after that speech, the government warned that the struggles of political power risked the profits that had been achieved.
“Those who organize such elections are later seen as guilty, and those who assume the position through them become objectives of public hatred,” said Yunus on Friday.
“One of the greatest responsibilities of this government is to guarantee a transparent election … and widely participatory so that the country does not fall into a new phase of crisis,” he added.
“That is why institutional reform is of the utmost importance.” Up to 1,400 people were killed between July and August 2024 after the Hasina government launched a repression in an attempt to hold on to power, according to the United Nations.
Hasina, 77, fled from helicopter to his former ally of India and has challenged an extradition order to return to Dhaka.
His trial opened in absence this month.
Yunus said that “the reforms, the judgments and the elections” were the three “central mandates” of his government.
“The sacrifices made by our students and people will be in vain if a good government cannot be established,” he said.
The Electoral Commission “will present a detailed road map” for the vote “at an appropriate time,” said the interim leader without specifying a date.
“We have been in dialogue with all interested parties to organize free, fair, competitive and credible choices in the history of Bangladesh,” Yunus added.
Posted in Dawn, June 7, 2025
