Politics of Bangladesh takes place in a framework of a parliamentary representative democratic republic, whereby the Prime Minister of Bangladesh is the head of government, and of a multi-party system. Executive power is exercised by the government. Legislative power is vested in both the government and parliament. The Constitution of Bangladesh was written in 1972 and has undergone seventeen amendments.
The Bangladesh Nationalist Party is a major political party in Bangladesh. Founded on 1 September 1978 by the late Bangladeshi president Ziaur Rahman, with a view of uniting people with a nationalist ideology, BNP later came out as one of the two most dominant parties in Bangladesh, along with its archrival Awami League. Initially being a big tent centrist party, it moved towards more right-wing politics later.
The Bangladesh Awami League, often simply called the Awami League or AL, is one of the major political parties in Bangladesh. The oldest existing political party in the country, the party played a large role in achieving Bangladeshi independence both before and after the Bangladesh Liberation War. As one of the two most dominant parties in the country, along with its archrival Bangladesh Nationalist Party, it has been the ruling party since 2009, and has since been described as authoritarian.
The prime minister of Bangladesh, officially prime minister of the People's Republic of Bangladesh is the chief executive of the government of Bangladesh. The prime minister and the cabinet are collectively accountable for their policies and actions to the Parliament, to their political party and ultimately to the electorate. The prime minister is ceremonially appointed by the president of Bangladesh.
Sheikh Hasina Wazed is a Bangladeshi politician and the tenth prime minister of Bangladesh from June 1996 to July 2001 and again serving since January 2009. She is the daughter of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the founding father and first president of Bangladesh. Having served for a combined total of over 20 years, she is the longest serving prime minister in the history of Bangladesh. As of 28 July 2024, she is the world's longest-serving female head of government.
Lt. Gen. Hussain Muhammad Ershad was a Bangladeshi military officer and politician who served as the president of Bangladesh from 1983 to 1990, heading a military dictatorship.
The Jatiya Party is a political party in Bangladesh. It is currently the main opposition in the Jatiya Sangsad, against the Awami League. The current chairman of the party is Ghulam Muhammed Quader. On 3 January 2019, the party announced its decision to join the Bangladesh Awami League-led Grand Alliance after having been in opposition for the previous parliamentary term. However, the party backtracked the next day and announced that it intended to remain part of the opposition. Currently, it holds Rangpur out of Bangladesh's 12 city corporations. The current chairperson of the party is Ghulam Muhammed Quader MP.
The Bangladesh Krishak Sramik Awami League was a political front comprising the Bangladesh Awami League, the Communist Party of Bangladesh, the National Awami Party (Muzaffar) and Bangladesh Jatiya League.
General elections were held in Bangladesh on 29 December 2008. The two main parties in the election were the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), led by Khaleda Zia, and the Bangladesh Awami League Party, led by Sheikh Hasina. The Bangladesh Awami League Party formed a fourteen-party Grand Alliance including Ershad's Jatiya Party, while the BNP formed a four-party alliance which included the Islamist party Jamaat-e-Islami. The election was originally scheduled for January 2007, but it was postponed by a military-controlled caretaker government for an extended period of time.
The Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal is a political party in Bangladesh. The party was founded by Serajul Alam Khan. The party was very dominant during 1972–1975 Bangladesh insurgency.
M Ilias Ali was a Bangladeshi politician and member of the Jatiya Sangsad (2001–2006) representing the Sylhet-2 constituency. He served as the organising secretary of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party. He, along with his personal car driver, Ansar Ali, went missing on 18 April 2012. Later that day, local police recovered his abandoned car near his residence in Banani neighborhood and found Ansar's cellphone inside. They have not been seen since. On the tenth anniversary of his disappearance, Netra News, an independent news platform in Sweden, reported on 21 April 2022, that Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), an elite Bangladeshi police unit, had carried out the disappearance. The platform cited leaked confidential documents and internal investigations documents from RAB to reach the conclusion.
Mohammed Zillur Rahman was a Bangladeshi politician who served as the President from 2009 to his death in 2013. He was also a senior presidium member of the Awami League. He is the third president of Bangladesh, after Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and Ziaur Rahman, to die in office, while being the first to die of natural causes.
Mohammad Abdul Jalil was a Bangladeshi politician. At the time of his death, he was a member of parliament for the Naogaon-5 constituency.
Amir Hossain Amu is a Bangladeshi politician, the incumbent Member of Parliament from Jhalokati-2, and served as the Minister of Industries during 2014–2019. He is currently the coordinator and spokesman for the Awami League-led 14-party Grand Alliance.
General elections were held in Bangladesh on 5 January 2014, in accordance with the constitutional requirement that elections must take place within the 90-day period before the expiration of the term of the Jatiya Sangshad on 24 January 2014.
Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir is a Bangladeshi politician. He has been the secretary general of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) since 2016. He was a member of the parliament for Thakurgaon-1 constituency from 2001 to 2006. In that term, he was also appointed as the Minister of State in charge of the Ministry of Agriculture and later Ministry of Civil Aviation and Tourism.
Abu Hena Mohammad Mustafa Kamal commonly known as Lotus Kamal is a Bangladeshi politician, former cricket official, and businessman. He is a member of the Jatiya Sangsad representing the Comilla-10 constituency and is a former Minister for Planning as well as Minister of Finance. He is the owner of Lotus Kamal Group, which is a well-known Bangladeshi conglomerate. Kamal was awarded the Finance Minister of the Year 2020 by magazine The Banker.
Awami League, known as Awami Muslim League before 1955, was an East Pakistan-based Pakistani political party founded by Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy in February 1950. Pir of Manki Sharif and Khan Ghulam Mohammad Khan from the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) joined it soon afterwards.
Abdul Matin Khasru was a Bangladeshi lawyer and politician. He was a Jatiya Sangsad member representing the Comilla-5 constituency during 1991–1995, 1996–2001 and 2009–2021. He served in the first Hasina cabinet as Minister of Law and Justice from 1997 until 2001.
Bangladesh Awami Swechasebak League is an associate body and the volunteer wing of the Bangladesh Awami League. Gazi Mesbaul Hossain Shachchu is the Acting President and Afzalur Rahman Babu the general secretary of the organization.
