Wednesday, 28 January, 2026
Bangladesh’s election campaign is burning with the intensity of a wildfire — yet the flames are consuming the wrong targets.
As political parties trade accusations and sensitive religious issues dominate headlines, the nation’s most urgent questions are being pushed aside. The referendum, human rights, democratic restoration and the economy have all been relegated to the margins. And the most crucial question remains unanswered: will the February 12 election truly deliver an elected government, or merely swap one symbol for another?
Above all, a pressing question has been raised by many: Will the February 12 election replace Muhammad Yunus? Could the ballot be a smoke screen?
The concern is not merely theoretical. It stems from a growing sense that the election could be used to legitimise a controlled transition rather than deliver real political change.
Leaders began the campaign promising a new tone — less attack, less blame, more focus on jobs, economic recovery and the future. Yet the familiar storm has returned, and voters are now forced to confront the contradiction between lofty promises and bitter reality. Campaign rallies have quickly reverted to the old playbook of accusation and intimidation, with political speeches repeatedly shifting from policy debate to personal attacks and inflammatory rhetoric.
This week, violence has surged again across several districts, particularly in areas where the NCP–Jamaat coalition has stepped up campaigning. In Chattogram and Rajshahi, clashes between rival party supporters left multiple people injured, with local police reporting the use of sticks and crude weapons. In Natore, a campaign convoy came under attack and several vehicles were damaged, while in Sylhet coalition supporters accused rival groups of provocation and alleged attempts to disrupt their rallies. These incidents have intensified fears that the election environment is rapidly sliding toward chaos.
Since the election schedule was announced in December 2025, at least 16 political activists have been killed. Reports indicate that over 133 deaths in total have been linked to political instability during this election season. High-intensity confrontations have erupted between the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and its former ally Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI), particularly over campaign activities in regions such as Sirajganj.
Allegations of attempts to “capture polling centres” have also surfaced, notably in Dhaka and other areas, with activists like Hasnat Abdullah warning of planned attacks intended to intimidate voters. In late January 2026, dozens were injured in clashes involving BNP supporters, rebels, and Jamaat activists. Targeted attacks on candidate offices — including the Jatiya Party office in Moulvibazar — have resulted in multiple injuries, further underscoring the growing volatility of the campaign period.
Amnesty International has warned that the February 12 election risks becoming a pageant of promises staged over a landscape of fear. The organisation has urged every party to place human rights at the centre of the campaign — not as decoration, but as a binding contract for governance. The warning comes amid increasing reports of intimidation, enforced disappearances, and pressure on journalists and activists, which critics say are being used to silence dissent and shape the narrative.
The NCP–Jamaat coalition, in particular, has been accused of stoking tensions by linking political competition to religious and cultural identity, while its opponents have alleged that the coalition is exploiting the election for political revenge rather than national reconciliation. In several areas, supporters of the coalition have been involved in protests demanding the release of detained leaders, and some clashes have been reported near venues where coalition rallies were held.
In this environment, the central question becomes sharper: Is the election truly a democratic reset, or merely a carefully staged performance designed to maintain the status quo?
For many voters, the ballot may not represent a choice — but a veil.
The Urgent Alarm: Freedom of Expression
The most immediate threat is the shrinking space for free expression. After youth leader Sharif Osman Hadi was killed in December, mobs attacked and torched major newspaper offices. Journalists reported threats so severe that they described their work as a fight for survival — conditions that choke any credible election atmosphere.
UN experts also fear the law itself is being weaponised: opposition figures are being arrested, activists and journalists pressured, and security laws used to police online speech — even after promised reforms.
Beyond the headlines, Amnesty points to crises that rarely dominate campaign stages but define the nation’s moral balance sheet: workers met with police violence while demanding better wages; Rohingya refugees facing worsening shortages and the constant threat of abduction or forced return; and Hindu and other minorities exposed to mob attacks amid a creeping culture of revenge.
Even climate stress has a human rights face — Dalit women cleaners, squeezed by worsening water and sanitation conditions, forced to walk farther for safe water while spending a punishing share of meagre incomes just to stay healthy.
This is the indictment: an election can count ballots, but without rights, it cannot measure freedom.
The Old Practices Return: The Blame Game
Bangladesh enters another election season as it enters the monsoon — with promises of cleansing and the certainty of flooding. Parties pledged restraint, but old rivalries and bitter accusations have shaped a bruising campaign.
At first, leaders spoke as if chastened by history. No more mudslinging, they said. No more vendettas. This time, it would be about jobs, prices, recovery — the future. The script sounded modern, almost mature.
Then, as always, the old reflex kicked in. Microphones became matchsticks. The past was dragged back onto the stage and set alight.
In Chuadanga and Lalmonirhat, the fire did not remain in speeches. Supporters clashed, proving once again what Bangladesh has learned the hard way: political language is not just language. It is mobilisation. It is permission.
This is not merely bad behaviour; it is a system that never learned another way. Bangladesh has not built a durable culture of policy debate — about schools, wages, hospitals, ports, power, and the cost of rice. Instead, it rehearses the same performance every cycle: identify an enemy, press on old injuries, and let anger do what organisation cannot. Elections become less a contest of plans than a referendum on hatred.
The ghosts of 2018 and 2024 hover like smog. In 2018, the Awami League warned of sabotage and “deep conspiracy,” while the BNP cried rigging and intimidation. By 2024, politics hardened into threat and counter-threat: “no way to escape” on one side, talk of jail on the other. These were not just lines — they were signals to cadres, cues to the crowd, hints of what comes after the ballots.
Since the election schedule was announced in December 2025, at least 16 political activists have been killed. Reports indicate that over 133 deaths in total have been linked to political instability during this election season. High-intensity confrontations have erupted between the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and its former ally Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI), particularly over campaign activities in regions such as Sirajganj.
Even the new vows collapsed on contact with reality. Tarique Rahman declared that blame would not fill stomachs; Jamaat’s Shafiqur Rahman said he did not want to criticise anyone. Then came the familiar pivot: allegations of ballot theft, conspiracies, vanished papers, bKash and NID manipulation, insinuations of foreign patrons. Shafiqur responded with warnings about extortion and ridicule of “family card” promises — which he suggested would only cost a bribe to access. The NCP, sensing opportunity, accused a rival camp of wearing the Awami League’s costume — corruption, terror, extortion, disappearances — under a new mask.
And religion, as ever, lurks nearby — ready to be poured into politics like kerosene.
Voters watch this with weary clarity. Many call political abuse a disease; some had hoped the post-2024 moment might force a different kind of campaigning. But survival is loud: rent, food, work, school fees. For many, speeches are just noise from a distant loudspeaker.
The danger for the parties is simple: the old poison may no longer taste as sweet. More voters now demand restraint, implementable promises, and a hint of decency. The stage is still dominated by blame — but the crowd is learning to walk away.
Will the February 12 Election Replace Muhammad Yunus?
This question has been raised by many, and for good reason. Critics argue that Bangladesh marches toward the February 12 election carrying an old vow — restoration — while walking into a new trap.
Ballots may be cast, seats may be won, even the BNP may emerge triumphant; yet Muhammad Yunus is unlikely to leave anytime soon. The obstacle is not votes. It is a post-election design built to delay transfer, dilute accountability, and harden “interim” rule into permanence.
The first signal looks harmless: procedure. Newly elected MPs will not form a government. They will be recast as a “Constituent Assembly” (Gonoporishod) for six months to rewrite constitutional provisions and pass foundational laws. During those 180 days, Yunus retains executive control. The election becomes a spectacle of representation without the substance of authority — an interregnum where the elected cannot govern and the unelected continue to rule.
History warns what comes next. Revolutions often promise democracy after “necessary reforms,” then stretch the waiting room into a residence — France, Egypt, Iran. Bangladesh appears to be rehearsing the same script: elections used not to transfer power, but to legitimise postponing it.
The deeper alarm lies in the constitution itself. Articles 7A and 7B criminalise unconstitutional seizures of power. Critics fear the new assembly’s true mission is to blunt or remove these safeguards, retroactively sanitising actions that would otherwise be unlawful. When rulers insist the rules must be rewritten before they relinquish office, suspicion becomes prudence.
The real chokehold is the same-day referendum. If it validates a July Charter that effectively displaces the 1972 constitution, MPs may not even be able to take their oaths until a new order is written. In that vacuum, authority does not migrate — it concentrates.
So the election may reshape parliament, but not governance. Bangladesh is not losing elections; it is losing what elections are meant to achieve: the peaceful, immediate transfer of power.
Comments
Bangladesh’s election campaign is burning with the intensity of a wildfire — yet the flames are consuming the wrong targets.
As political parties trade accusations and sensitive religious issues dominate headlines, the nation’s most urgent questions are being pushed aside. The referendum, human rights, democratic restoration and the economy have all been relegated to the margins. And the most crucial question remains unanswered: will the February 12 election truly deliver an elected government, or merely swap one symbol for another?
Above all, a pressing question has been raised by many: Will the February 12 election replace Muhammad Yunus? Could the ballot be a smoke screen?
The concern is not merely theoretical. It stems from a growing sense that the election could be used to legitimise a controlled transition rather than deliver real political change.
Leaders began the campaign promising a new tone — less attack, less blame, more focus on jobs, economic recovery and the future. Yet the familiar storm has returned, and voters are now forced to confront the contradiction between lofty promises and bitter reality. Campaign rallies have quickly reverted to the old playbook of accusation and intimidation, with political speeches repeatedly shifting from policy debate to personal attacks and inflammatory rhetoric.
This week, violence has surged again across several districts, particularly in areas where the NCP–Jamaat coalition has stepped up campaigning. In Chattogram and Rajshahi, clashes between rival party supporters left multiple people injured, with local police reporting the use of sticks and crude weapons. In Natore, a campaign convoy came under attack and several vehicles were damaged, while in Sylhet coalition supporters accused rival groups of provocation and alleged attempts to disrupt their rallies. These incidents have intensified fears that the election environment is rapidly sliding toward chaos.
Since the election schedule was announced in December 2025, at least 16 political activists have been killed. Reports indicate that over 133 deaths in total have been linked to political instability during this election season. High-intensity confrontations have erupted between the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and its former ally Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI), particularly over campaign activities in regions such as Sirajganj.
Allegations of attempts to “capture polling centres” have also surfaced, notably in Dhaka and other areas, with activists like Hasnat Abdullah warning of planned attacks intended to intimidate voters. In late January 2026, dozens were injured in clashes involving BNP supporters, rebels, and Jamaat activists. Targeted attacks on candidate offices — including the Jatiya Party office in Moulvibazar — have resulted in multiple injuries, further underscoring the growing volatility of the campaign period.
Amnesty International has warned that the February 12 election risks becoming a pageant of promises staged over a landscape of fear. The organisation has urged every party to place human rights at the centre of the campaign — not as decoration, but as a binding contract for governance. The warning comes amid increasing reports of intimidation, enforced disappearances, and pressure on journalists and activists, which critics say are being used to silence dissent and shape the narrative.
The NCP–Jamaat coalition, in particular, has been accused of stoking tensions by linking political competition to religious and cultural identity, while its opponents have alleged that the coalition is exploiting the election for political revenge rather than national reconciliation. In several areas, supporters of the coalition have been involved in protests demanding the release of detained leaders, and some clashes have been reported near venues where coalition rallies were held.
In this environment, the central question becomes sharper: Is the election truly a democratic reset, or merely a carefully staged performance designed to maintain the status quo?
For many voters, the ballot may not represent a choice — but a veil.
The Urgent Alarm: Freedom of Expression
The most immediate threat is the shrinking space for free expression. After youth leader Sharif Osman Hadi was killed in December, mobs attacked and torched major newspaper offices. Journalists reported threats so severe that they described their work as a fight for survival — conditions that choke any credible election atmosphere.
UN experts also fear the law itself is being weaponised: opposition figures are being arrested, activists and journalists pressured, and security laws used to police online speech — even after promised reforms.
Beyond the headlines, Amnesty points to crises that rarely dominate campaign stages but define the nation’s moral balance sheet: workers met with police violence while demanding better wages; Rohingya refugees facing worsening shortages and the constant threat of abduction or forced return; and Hindu and other minorities exposed to mob attacks amid a creeping culture of revenge.
Even climate stress has a human rights face — Dalit women cleaners, squeezed by worsening water and sanitation conditions, forced to walk farther for safe water while spending a punishing share of meagre incomes just to stay healthy.
This is the indictment: an election can count ballots, but without rights, it cannot measure freedom.
The Old Practices Return: The Blame Game
Bangladesh enters another election season as it enters the monsoon — with promises of cleansing and the certainty of flooding. Parties pledged restraint, but old rivalries and bitter accusations have shaped a bruising campaign.
At first, leaders spoke as if chastened by history. No more mudslinging, they said. No more vendettas. This time, it would be about jobs, prices, recovery — the future. The script sounded modern, almost mature.
Then, as always, the old reflex kicked in. Microphones became matchsticks. The past was dragged back onto the stage and set alight.
In Chuadanga and Lalmonirhat, the fire did not remain in speeches. Supporters clashed, proving once again what Bangladesh has learned the hard way: political language is not just language. It is mobilisation. It is permission.
This is not merely bad behaviour; it is a system that never learned another way. Bangladesh has not built a durable culture of policy debate — about schools, wages, hospitals, ports, power, and the cost of rice. Instead, it rehearses the same performance every cycle: identify an enemy, press on old injuries, and let anger do what organisation cannot. Elections become less a contest of plans than a referendum on hatred.
The ghosts of 2018 and 2024 hover like smog. In 2018, the Awami League warned of sabotage and “deep conspiracy,” while the BNP cried rigging and intimidation. By 2024, politics hardened into threat and counter-threat: “no way to escape” on one side, talk of jail on the other. These were not just lines — they were signals to cadres, cues to the crowd, hints of what comes after the ballots.
Since the election schedule was announced in December 2025, at least 16 political activists have been killed. Reports indicate that over 133 deaths in total have been linked to political instability during this election season. High-intensity confrontations have erupted between the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and its former ally Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI), particularly over campaign activities in regions such as Sirajganj.
Even the new vows collapsed on contact with reality. Tarique Rahman declared that blame would not fill stomachs; Jamaat’s Shafiqur Rahman said he did not want to criticise anyone. Then came the familiar pivot: allegations of ballot theft, conspiracies, vanished papers, bKash and NID manipulation, insinuations of foreign patrons. Shafiqur responded with warnings about extortion and ridicule of “family card” promises — which he suggested would only cost a bribe to access. The NCP, sensing opportunity, accused a rival camp of wearing the Awami League’s costume — corruption, terror, extortion, disappearances — under a new mask.
And religion, as ever, lurks nearby — ready to be poured into politics like kerosene.
Voters watch this with weary clarity. Many call political abuse a disease; some had hoped the post-2024 moment might force a different kind of campaigning. But survival is loud: rent, food, work, school fees. For many, speeches are just noise from a distant loudspeaker.
The danger for the parties is simple: the old poison may no longer taste as sweet. More voters now demand restraint, implementable promises, and a hint of decency. The stage is still dominated by blame — but the crowd is learning to walk away.
Will the February 12 Election Replace Muhammad Yunus?
This question has been raised by many, and for good reason. Critics argue that Bangladesh marches toward the February 12 election carrying an old vow — restoration — while walking into a new trap.
Ballots may be cast, seats may be won, even the BNP may emerge triumphant; yet Muhammad Yunus is unlikely to leave anytime soon. The obstacle is not votes. It is a post-election design built to delay transfer, dilute accountability, and harden “interim” rule into permanence.
The first signal looks harmless: procedure. Newly elected MPs will not form a government. They will be recast as a “Constituent Assembly” (Gonoporishod) for six months to rewrite constitutional provisions and pass foundational laws. During those 180 days, Yunus retains executive control. The election becomes a spectacle of representation without the substance of authority — an interregnum where the elected cannot govern and the unelected continue to rule.
History warns what comes next. Revolutions often promise democracy after “necessary reforms,” then stretch the waiting room into a residence — France, Egypt, Iran. Bangladesh appears to be rehearsing the same script: elections used not to transfer power, but to legitimise postponing it.
The deeper alarm lies in the constitution itself. Articles 7A and 7B criminalise unconstitutional seizures of power. Critics fear the new assembly’s true mission is to blunt or remove these safeguards, retroactively sanitising actions that would otherwise be unlawful. When rulers insist the rules must be rewritten before they relinquish office, suspicion becomes prudence.
The real chokehold is the same-day referendum. If it validates a July Charter that effectively displaces the 1972 constitution, MPs may not even be able to take their oaths until a new order is written. In that vacuum, authority does not migrate — it concentrates.
So the election may reshape parliament, but not governance. Bangladesh is not losing elections; it is losing what elections are meant to achieve: the peaceful, immediate transfer of power.
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