Dhaka: Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, a longtime secretary general of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and a close ally of former premier Khaleda Zia, was nominated by the ruling party Thursday as its presidential candidate.
The presidential election scheduled for August 20 was necessitated after Mohammed Shahabuddin, a close aide of deposed prime minister Sheikh Hasina, resigned last month on health grounds before completing his five-year tenure.
Prime Minister Tarique Rahman, who is also the BNP chairman, declared Alamgir as the party’s presidential candidate at a meeting of the party’s standing committee Thursday, setting the stage for his election as the next head of state.
The 78-year-old BNP stalwart resigned as the secretary general and from the party’s highest policy-making standing committee after his nomination, senior BNP joint secretary general Ruhul Kabir Rizvi announced.
“It is with great pleasure that I announce on behalf of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party that our dedicated secretary general, Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, has become the BNP’s presidential candidate,” he said.
Under the Election Commission’s schedule, Alamgir was required to submit his nomination papers by 4:00 pm on Thursday.
Bangladesh’s main opposition Jamaat-e-Islami has also fielded the party-led alliance partner Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) Chairman Colonel (retd) Oli Ahmad.
Ahmad has already submitted his nomination papers to the Election Commission.
Under the Constitution, a new president is required to be elected within 90 days of the office falling vacant.
Parliamentary Speaker Hafiz Uddin Ahmad is currently serving as acting president, as required under the Constitution following a vacancy in the office.
The Constitution provides for the president to be elected by Parliament.
The BNP, which was voted to power in the February 12 elections, currently commands a two-thirds majority in Parliament, putting Alamgir in a strong position to secure the presidency.
If elected, Alamgir will become Bangladesh’s 23rd president. He has been one of the BNP’s most prominent leaders for more than two decades, having served as acting secretary general from 2011 before formally taking over the post in 2016.
He played a prominent role in leading the BNP during the imprisonment of its then-chairperson and former prime minister Zia and the absence of Rahman, who was abroad at the time.
The president is largely a ceremonial head of state under Bangladesh’s parliamentary system, with key constitutional powers, including appointing the prime minister and the chief justice.
Though the president is the supreme commander of the armed forces, those powers are generally exercised on the advice of the prime minister.
Political analysts, however, said the presidency could assume greater significance under the caretaker government system recently reintroduced to oversee general elections, when the president’s power would increase significantly in commanding the armed forces during such a period.
The analysts also opine that Alamgir’s nomination could be a well-calculated move of BNP, which in its election manifesto had promised to equip the president with more power by amending the Constitution.
An economist by training, Alamgir made his political debut as a left-leaning student activist when Bangladesh was still East Pakistan. Bangladesh was liberated from Pakistan with India’s help in 1971.
After joining the BNP in the early 90s, Alamgir served as state minister for agriculture and civil aviation.
When the BNP returned to power in the February 12 elections this year, Alamgir was made the local government minister.
Shahabuddin, a 1971 Liberation War veteran and former lower judiciary judge, was elected to the highest office by the previous Parliament and was the only person still holding his constitutional position, long after the violent July-August 2024 student-led street protest that toppled Hasina’s Awami League government.
Though the 76-year-old leader cited health complications as the reason for his resignation, it came amid speculations that PM Rahman’s government was uncomfortable with the largely titular head of state.
Some reports had claimed that Shahabuddin contacted Hasina over the phone, disappointing BNP’s top leadership. The former president had dismissed the reports as “baseless”.
Hasina fled to India and has been living there since August 5, 2024.
