It has been mentioned that for the previous 15 years, Bangladesh’s elections have been so skewed in favour of the ruling Awami League, they’re sufficient to make North Korea’s Kim Jong Un squirm with envy. An unfair comparability maybe, however Sunday’s results, the place the celebration, led by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, secured 222 seats out of 300, are sufficient to make even essentially the most unbiased amongst us increase a sceptical eyebrow.
However ought to we actually be stunned by what was a foregone conclusion? And what does the outcome imply for the way forward for Bangladesh? On condition that the election was uncontested by the nation’s essential opposition, the Bangladesh Nationalist Celebration (BNP), amid issues that it could be rigged, and with massive swaths of the 120 million eligible voters abstaining, it’s hardly surprising that the Awami League swept the board. Officers say some 40 p.c of voters went to the polls, however media experiences and analysts suggest the real figure is probably going no more than 30 p.c. Both manner, it’s clear that the individuals of Bangladesh voted with their ft.
A glance again on the 2018 elections reminds us that the BNP’s issues had been not unfounded. On the time, Human Rights Watch and different teams referred to as for an impartial investigation following allegations of voter intimidation, vote rigging and partisan behaviour by election officers. Added to this, a UK broadcaster filmed a stuffed poll field being taken away from a polling station earlier than it had even opened. Little marvel, then, that the BNP feared the identical would occur once more.
Extra lately, on October 28, the large antigovernment protest that turned violent signalled a powerful and systematic crackdown on dissent forward of the elections. On that day, a whole bunch of hundreds of opposition supporters demanded Hasina step down and the set up of a impartial caretaker authorities. Tens of hundreds of protesters, together with senior leaders, had been arrested and thrown into jail following speedy trials. They included those that had not even been concerned within the protests, however as an alternative had circumstances towards them courting again greater than a decade. Authorities declare they had been cracking down on violence however human rights teams outlined what occurred as “a violent autocratic crackdown forward of the election”.
The federal government denies Sunday’s election was uncontested regardless of the BNP’s boycott, saying 27 events took half, in addition to impartial candidates, and that greater than 100 impartial election observers had been current. However this, although technically true, doesn’t allay issues. A lot of Sunday’s so-called “independents” are Awami League supporters. Bangladeshi media additionally reported that the celebration intentionally didn’t subject any candidates in a number of constituencies, as an alternative making house for its ally, the Jatiya Celebration.
The street to a one-party state has been a gradual one, with Sheikh Hasina – the world’s longest-serving feminine prime minister – being positioned on the helm of the nation for a fourth consecutive time period and, for all intents and functions, unchallenged. Ironic for the daughter of the nation’s founding father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, who, alongside along with her bitter rival, former BNP chief Khaleda Zia, fought so arduous for years for multiparty democracy and an finish to army rule.
That doesn’t downplay the BNP’s personal historical past of oppression and assaults on democracy. Throughout its two-term rule (1991-96 and 2001-06), it was confronted with most of the accusations presently confronted by the Awami League: corruption, human rights abuses, suppression of opposition teams and extra. What’s extra, the celebration is tarnished with a historical past of being borne out of a army dictatorship: it was based by Zia’s late husband, Ziaur Rahman, a military chief of employees who was president of Bangladesh from 1977 till his assassination in 1981.
The BNP has prior to now additionally joined forces with Jamaat-e-Islami – a conservative celebration that didn’t assist Bangladesh’s independence in 1971 and has by no means made a lot headway within the poll field. The BNP’s present appearing chairman, Tarique Rahman, is a convicted criminal – albeit on costs his celebration says are politically motived – and residing in exile in London. It’s a observe document that doesn’t bode effectively for a celebration determined to regain energy.
But the October protests revealed that the celebration nonetheless has widespread assist, and in a rustic the place there may be rising discontent over the federal government’s dealing with of the financial downturn, it’s fairly doable that the BNP would have had a good likelihood of successful, had the election been genuinely aggressive.
As issues stand, Hasina stays the excessive priestess of Bangladesh’s distinct type of dynastic democracy. With a powerful majority in parliament for one more time period, her celebration can proceed to push via any laws it sees match, with little by the use of checks and balances.
And with any resistance silenced, at the very least for now, the bottom is fertile for extra of the form of human rights abuses the nation already stands accused of. Even when the opposition continues to mobilise itself post-election, Hasina’s safety forces are prone to proceed their crackdown and see to it that dissenting voices pay a heavy worth.
If there may be any stress from exterior Bangladesh, it’s almost definitely to return from the US. Earlier than the election, Washington ramped up its political muscle-flexing with a number of current visits to Dhaka by senior officers and by imposing visa bans on people it describes as “undermining the democratic course of”.
There was additionally the specter of sanctions. The US and the European Union are the most important importers of Bangladesh’s readymade clothes – an trade value $45bn. Pierre Prakash, director of the Worldwide Disaster Group’s Asia Programme, instructed me that any restrictions on the sector may inflict additional ache on a inhabitants already reeling from rising meals and gas costs.
“It will be difficult to give you sanctions which can be efficient and on the similar don’t harm tens of millions of individuals,” he defined. “The overwhelming majority of staff employed by the garment trade are ladies, so sanctions may additionally work towards ladies’s empowerment.”
It’s not stunning, then, that US has already issued a post-election assertion stating that it doesn’t consider the elections had been free and truthful, however that it “notes” that the Awami League gained. It seems like a volte-face. It is aware of that if it imposes sanctions, not solely may it find yourself punishing widespread Bangladeshis, but it surely additionally dangers a dent in its coffers. Shopping for from different sources could enhance its prices marginally, however it’s an extra value the US can do with out at a time when the nation has spent billions of {dollars} on army support to Ukraine and Israel, and Individuals throughout the nation are feeling the pinch of a cost-of-living disaster.
For Bangladesh’s neighbours and allies, the election is much less of a priority. As a one-party state, China is hardly the standard-bearer for democracy. And India, the place there are rising indicators of democratic backsliding and rising autocracy, can also be not able to start out finger-pointing.
The denouncements of this yr’s stage-managed election echo these of 2014 and 2018. Again then, little motion was taken, and as soon as the mud had settled, Hasina was welcomed into the worldwide fold. Admittedly, it was an period when she had the assist of lots of her countryfolk and was credited for turning Bangladesh into one of many fastest-growing economies within the area, combating terrorism and offering shelter for greater than 1,000,000 Rohingya refugees.
Now, although, instances have modified. Hasina’s recognition has waned, largely as a result of monetary hardships her individuals are dealing with, but additionally as a result of little doubt is left that she has instrumentalised the state equipment to cling on to energy.
Regardless of this, evidently the worst Hasina can count on are restricted sanctions by the US. If that occurs – and it’s nonetheless an “if” – the nation’s beleaguered financial system will undoubtedly be dented additional. However with Chinese language and Indian footprints firmly inside its territory, Western stress is prone to have much less of an affect on Bangladesh than it has prior to now. There’s no denying, nonetheless, that whereas it could be enterprise as typical for Sheikh Hasina for the following 5 years, it is going to be so with no mandate from her individuals.
The views expressed on this article are the creator’s personal and don’t essentially replicate Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.
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