Will Bangladesh's new leadership be able to deliver on promises? | BBC News

Welcome to the Global News podcast on. YouTube, where we go behind the. headlines. Hello, I'm Oliver Conway. And. today we're asking what next for. Bangladesh after the first election. since that huge student uprising in. 2024. We're joined from the Bangladeshi. capital by our correspondent Asaday. Misheri. And Asaday, first of all, let's. put this election in context. Remind us. of this long-running and bitter rivalry. between these two power blocks, the BNP,

the Bangladesh National Party, and the. Awami League. >> Yes, the Awami League has now been. replaced by its archrival, the. Bangladesh Nationalist Party, because. these two parties have dominated. politics for decades in the country. And. both of them were headed by two women. for a very long time. Khaleda Zia of the. BNP, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, and in fact Tarique Rahman's late. mother, as well as Sheikh Hasina of the. Awami League, who of course was toppled.

in that student uprising in 2024, the. reason why all of this was even. possible. Now, the two shared a lot of. enmity, and they both represented political. dynasties. Sheikh Hasina's father was. considered the founder of Bangladesh, the father of the nation is often what. he would be called, and that's because. of the war of independence and the. leading role he had, as did the party, the Awami League. Khaleda Zia's. late husband, Ziaur Rahman, was a president and leader of the.

country, and he was later assassinated. in a military coup. And so, the legacy. of both these men is what allowed these. two women to then rise up, enter. politics, and dominate it for so long. But they were bitter enemies, and that. meant that Khaleda Zia had multiple. corruption charges against her. She. alleged that these were politically. motivated under Awami League rule, as. did Sheikh Hasina have suffer when the. BNP government uh was was in power as.

well because even though this is a party. that is now arrived at a time when. people were calling for change and. overthrew. a government that unleashed a brutal. crackdown on young protesters. The BNP is very much an older. established party. >> Yeah, so August 2024 the Awami League. thrown out Sheikh Hasina flees. Then. fast forward to the elections this week. The BNP back in power. Take us through.

the results. >> Yeah, it's a huge turnaround for Tarique. Rahman because in the last elections he. was in self-imposed exile in London. He. only returned in December after 17 years. of self-imposed exile. The BNP had. boycotted those elections because. thousands of their members and their. supporters were jailed. And so for him. to now be the next Prime Minister of. Bangladesh is a huge reversal in his. fortunes but not not only that when you. look at the results the BNP won by a.

landslide. They won more than two-thirds. of the contested seats. Jamaat-e-Islami. came second and that is very significant. because Jamaat-e-Islami. also suffered under Sheikh Hasina's. rule. They were banned for years. Many of. their politicians were also jailed. Some. were hanged. And yet now they have more than 70 seats. in this election. That's a huge reversal.

for a party that at best had won 12% of. the vote. There is also a third. contender here that is very important. and that's the National. the National Citizen Party or NCP. They. were they were a new party and they were. formed about seven or eight months ago. by the faces of the uprising the. students who made this all possible. And. so they hoped that they would be able to. stand on their TV two feet and lead the. country into this change, but they. really struggled with support. A a new.

party in a country where two parties had. dominated politics for so long. And so, they entered a very controversial. alliance with with Jamaat-e-Islami, that. Islamist party. And so, dozens of their. members resigned saying that's not what. they'd really signed up for, especially. certain women who were very concerned by. Jamaat-e-Islami, an alliance with Jamaat-e-Islami and. what that would mean for women in the. country. >> Now, against that backdrop of long. domination by these two political.

parties, this election was described as. the most competitive for years. But how. is that possible when the Awami League. was banned? >> Yeah, it's a complicated one, isn't it? On the one hand, you travel across the. country as as our team has in the past. few weeks. We've been on the campaign. trail and we've gone to to several areas. where most voters will tell you this is. the first time that they felt they could. vote freely. Especially when you gotten. near to near polling day, you were.

seeing rival banners of parties on all. these streets. You saw rival activists. in the same neighborhoods fighting for. every vote. And more importantly, no one. felt like they really knew the result. Even you if you talked about. front-runners and Khaleda Zia and and. the rise of the BNP after all those. years of suffering, you really weren't. sure whether it was going to be a. victory, let alone a landslide. And that. was a huge overwhelming feeling for. people. In fact, when I when I'd speak. to some voters, they would say, when I'd.

ask them about issues, they they weren't. so much concerned about the economy and. unemployment, though that would come up. because Bangladesh does have a very big. challenges, but overwhelmingly the first. thing they would say is we want freedom. We want an end to corruption. And so, it was a competitive race and it. was to them a very free race. Now was it. fair as Muhammad Yunus, the interim. leader, had promised? That is an. altogether different question because as. you mentioned the Awami League was.

banned from contesting. The interim. government and the election commission. when pressed about it told us that this. was because of an anti-terrorism law and. they argue that these elections couldn't. be free and fair if they weren't able to. participate. That's what one Awami. League politician in hiding told me when. I went to visit him and and his we're. keeping his identity private because so. many of their politicians are in hiding. Sheikh Hasina herself is in exile in. India. And then when we traveled to.

certain other areas like Gopalganj, which is an Awami League stronghold, where so many of the supporters live, you you get this sense that there are a. lot of people there that are completely. disenfranchised now. and that surely feel cast aside when the. party that they would have chosen wasn't. even on the ballot. >> Now after months of unrest and economic. disruption, there are plenty of. challenges. The BNP has a big majority. What will be its priorities?

>> The biggest priority will link to. another vote that happened on polling. day and that's the referendum, the July. charter referendum and and the big goal. of that was to put a lot of checks and. balances in place so that there would be. an end to corruption, so that there. would be this check on the executive. that many people here felt didn't exist. before. And so for example, you would. limit prime ministerial term limits. There would be an upper house of 100. members created and the the judiciary.

would also. be strengthened to be made more. independent. And so Teddy Rahman. will need to convince a lot of voters. that he truly does represent change. That is the message that was out there. on the campaign trail. We saw that. repeated, but the BNP, as we've. discussed, does have a long history. There were people who didn't vote for. him, and certainly there are the Awami. League supporters who did not vote for. him. So, he'll need to unite the. country. He will need to restore some.

political stability in the country. He'll want to make sure law and order. seems stable here as well, so that not. only is some foreign investment is. willing to come back in, but that. businesses create more jobs to help. people. So, there are a range of of. economic issues he needs to to handle, to tackle, including inflation, rising. prices, salaries that just aren't. keeping up with the price of basic goods. and foods. It's a lot on his plate. >> Now, Tarique Rahman, the son of not one. but two former leaders, is continuing a.

political dynasty. After all the. optimism of the uprising in 2024, how. are people in Bangladesh feeling today? >> It's really complicated for the students. in particular, because they were at.