\n Bangladesh voted Thursday in its first election since a deadly 2024 uprising, as parties crushed under Sheikh Hasina's rule return to the fray with a powerful political heir facing an Islamist-led coalition.\n<\/p>\n
\n Voters lined up outside polling stations in the capital Dhaka in the hugely anticipated election, while key party leaders have raised fears of threats or \"conspiracies\" to derail the vote.\n<\/p>\n
\n More than 300,000 soldiers and police are deployed countrywide, with UN experts warning ahead of voting of \"growing intolerance, threats and attacks\", and a \"tsunami of disinformation\", especially targeting millions of young first-time voters.\n<\/p>\n
\n \"This was my first vote,\" said Shithi Goswami, 21, a student at Dhaka City College. \"I hope after everything we went through the last few years, now is the time for something positive.\"\n<\/p>\n
\n Leading prime ministerial hopeful Tarique Rahman, 60, said he was \"confident\" his Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) can regain power in the South Asian nation of 170 million people.\n<\/p>\n
\n But he faces a stiff challenge from a coalition led by the Muslim-majority country's largest Islamist party, Jamaat-e-Islami.\n<\/p>\n
\n \"If people in Bangladesh come out to cast their votes, conspiracies will not succeed,\" the BNP's Rahman said after voting.\n<\/p>\n
\n Jamaat chief Shafiqur Rahman, 67, has mounted a disciplined grassroots campaign, and if victorious, the former political prisoner could form the first Islamist-led government in constitutionally secular Bangladesh.\n<\/p>\n
\n Jamaat, who have campaigned on a platform of justice and ending corruption, sense their biggest opportunity in decades, with party leader Rahman saying it \"will do whatever is required\" to ensure a fair result.\n<\/p>\n
\n - 'Ended the nightmare' -\n<\/p>\n
\n Opinion polls vary widely, though most give the BNP the lead -- with some suggesting a knife-edge race.\n<\/p>\n
\n During campaigning, political clashes killed five people and injured more than 600, police records show.\n<\/p>\n
\n Election Commissioner AMM Nasir Uddin said the vote was going \"smoothly in a free and fair manner\", with \"a few minor disruptions\" -- noting the main threat was a flood of disinformation on social media.\n<\/p>\n
\n Interim leader Muhammad Yunus, who will step down once the new government takes power, has said the vote \"will determine the future direction of the country\".\n<\/p>\n
\n The 85-year-old Nobel Peace Prize winner has led the South Asian nation since Hasina's 15-year rule ended with her ouster in August 2024.\n<\/p>\n
\n His administration has barred her Awami League party from contesting the polls.\n<\/p>\n
\n Hasina, 78, was sentenced to death in absentia for crimes against humanity for the bloody crackdown on protesters during her final months in power, and remains in hiding in India.\n<\/p>\n
\n Yunus, speaking after voting, said that the country had \"ended the nightmare and begun a new dream.\"\n<\/p>\n
\n - 'Spirit of the uprising' -\n<\/p>\n
\n He has championed a sweeping democratic reform charter to overhaul what he called a \"completely broken\" system of government and to prevent a return to one?party rule.\n<\/p>\n
\n The 127 million voters are also voting in a referendum on whether to endorse proposals for prime-ministerial term limits, a new upper house of parliament, stronger presidential powers and greater judicial independence.\n<\/p>\n
\n Yeasin Arafat Emon, 25, said he had backed the charter as it \"reflects the spirit of the uprising\".\n<\/p>\n
\n Voters will elect 300 lawmakers directly, with a further 50 women chosen from party lists.\n<\/p>\n
\n Counting by hand begins after polls close at 4:30 pm (1030 GMT), with first significant results expected potentially overnight.\n<\/p>\n
\n The next government will inherit a battered economy in the world's second-largest garment exporter, as well as delicate relations with India.\n<\/p>\n
\n The BNP's Rahman -- whose late parents both led the country -- told AFP ahead of the vote that his first priority, if elected, would be restoring security and stability.\n<\/p>\n
\n But he warned the challenges ahead were immense, and that \"the economy has been destroyed\".<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Bangladesh voted Thursday in its first election since a deadly 2024 uprising, as parties crushed under Sheikh Hasina's rule return to the fray with a powerful political heir facing an Islamist-led coalition. Voters lined up outside polling stations in the capital Dhaka in the hugely anticipated election, while key party leaders have raised fears of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":60,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[553],"tags":[],"ji_location":[],"class_list":["post-155288","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-live-feed"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n