We all know that Sheikh Hasina did not assume power on military tanks or in uniform. She came to power through elections, specifically the 29 December 2008 election, though its legitimacy remains debated. She didn’t abolish the constitution upon taking office. It was the existing legal framework, institutional rules and procedures that transformed the system into an authoritarian regime.
A shift in legal structures, especially the exercise of brute parliamentary majority to pass the 15th constitutional amendment unilaterally, along with repressive legal instruments to silence political opponents and dissent, accelerated and entrenched her authoritarian rule.
One foundational enabler of this authoritarianism is the repeated reelection of the same prime minister. As noted by the renowned writer and former advisor to the caretaker government, the late Dr. Akbar Ali Khan, Bangladesh’s prime minister holds more power than a Russian czar or an Indian Mughal emperor.
The framers of our constitution endowed the office of prime minister with sweeping authority, while deliberately reducing the president to a ceremonial figure. Under Article 48 (3), except for appointing the prime minister and chief justice, the president must act on the prime minister’s advice. Meanwhile, Article 55 (2) vests all executive power in the prime minister’s singular control, even though in typical parliamentary systems, the cabinet ostensibly shares executive leadership.
In 1975, the 4th amendment introduced a presidential system, granting the president authority over the executive, legislature, and judiciary. However, the 12th amendment in 1991 restored the parliamentary model, returning much power to the prime minister. Over time, this system evolved into a quasi-monarchical premiership.
Had Sheikh Hasina been prime minister without simultaneously being party chief, perhaps she wouldn’t have turned into the monster she eventually became, and the brutality witnessed during the July 2024 uprising might have been avoided
When one individual can serve forever as prime minister, concentrate all powers and become all-powerful, authoritarianism becomes inevitable. People around them develop boundless loyalty and become captive to their rule. To counter this, the BNP’s 31-point demand included a limit of two terms for prime ministers.
Another source of the prime minister’s concentrated power is her simultaneously holding three roles: prime minister, parliamentary party leader, and head of her party. Not only is that concentration practically problematic, it also conflicts with the principle of separation of powers. Moreover, a political party theoretically should serve as a watchdog over government. The leader of the parliamentary party and the leader of parliament are not one. In a parliamentary system, generally speaking, the prime minister is the leader of the parliamentary party.
The prime minister simultaneously holding the position of party chief is even more problematic. By definition, political parties and civil society are both components of the broader civic sphere. One of the core responsibilities of civil society is to play a watchdog role—to prevent abuse of power and protect citizens’ rights. Political parties, too, can serve in that watchdog capacity and help curb the misuse of power. This can be clarified through an example.
Before the 9th national parliamentary election in 2008, Awami League released a highly appealing election manifesto titled "Charter for Change", which played a significant role in securing their landslide victory in that election.
This manifesto represented the Awami League’s pre-election pledges to the voters. Alongside announcing this manifesto, the party also nominated its candidates for the 9th parliamentary election with the goal of implementing those pledges. Therefore, the government formed after the election had the responsibility to fulfill the Awami League’s pre-election promises, that is, to implement the Charter for Change.
After the election, it was the party’s duty to hold the cabinet, formed under the leadership of Sheikh Hasina, accountable, to ask how much of the Charter for Change had been fulfilled, to demand explanations for what hadn’t been achieved, and to present a clear roadmap for addressing those shortcomings. But the party was utterly unable to bring the government under such accountability. The reason was that Sheikh Hasina was not only the prime minister, she was also the head of the Awami League.
Had Sheikh Hasina been prime minister without simultaneously being party chief, perhaps she wouldn’t have turned into the monster she eventually became, and the brutality witnessed during the July 2024 uprising might have been avoided. In other words, it was this combination of roles, prime minister, leader of the House, and party chief in one person, for which wami League, as a party, had to pay the price.
Awami League also paid the price in another way: through the extreme centralisation of power in the prime minister’s hands. In a genuinely democratic system, the opposition is also a part of governance. But in Bangladesh’s political culture, a "winner-takes-all" system prevails. Under this system, the party that wins an election ends up enjoying virtually all the powers and privileges of the state, while members of the opposition, especially due to a culture of repression, are pushed to the brink of extinction.
A particularly toxic expression of this winner-takes-all model is the complete erasure of the boundary between the government and the ruling party, where everything becomes the possession of those in power.
This is why, during the July uprising, not only did law enforcement agencies attack the protesters, but party leaders and activists also carried out assaults, injuring and killing many. And this was made possible because of the prime minister’s absolute dominance over her party. Therefore, as a party, Awami League cannot avoid responsibility for the killings that took place in July and August.
This is also why, in other democratic countries, the prime minister is not the head of the party. For example, while Narendra Modi is the prime minister of India, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is led by Jagat Prakash Nadda. During Manmohan Singh’s tenure as prime minister, the president of the Congress Party was Sonia Gandhi.
Thus, to establish an effective democratic system and to prevent the re-emergence of authoritarianism, we too must end the concentration of absolute power in the hands of the prime minister. It must be ensured that the same person does not simultaneously serve as prime minister, leader of the House, and especially, party chief. Notably, in a democratic state, the principle of separation of powers was developed by scholars precisely to prevent the concentration of authority in one individual’s hands, which could lead to the violation of citizens’ rights.
* Badiul Alam Majumdar is Secretary, Citizens for Good Governance (SHUJON)
* The opinions expressed are the author’s own