Bangladeshi lawmakers elected veteran Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) leader Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir as the country’s new president on Thursday, making the longtime opposition figure the head of state after his party came to power in a major political transition.
The BNP returned to power in February in the long wake of the fall of Sheikh Hasina’s Awami League government in 2024. While the presidency is largely ceremonial, Alamgir will serve as head of state and commander-in-chief of the armed forces. Executive authority remains with the prime minister and cabinet in the South Asian nation of about 173 million people.
Alamgir, 78, defeated Oli Ahmed, a retired army colonel and chairman of the Liberal Democratic Party and candidate of the Jamaat-e-Islami-led 11-party opposition alliance, in a parliamentary vote.
Chief Election Commissioner A.M.M. Nasir Uddin declared Alamgir the winner after the 255-to-88 vote.
He is expected to be sworn in on Friday evening.
