Bangladesh to vote in election without opposition

DHAKA: Bangladesh votes on Sunday in an election guaranteed to give Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina her fifth term in office, after a boycott by opposition parties whose ranks have been decimated by mass arrests.

Hasina´s ruling Awami League has presided over exceptional growth in a country once beset by grinding poverty, thanks to a lucrative garment export industry supplying the world´s top fast fashion brands.

But her tenure has also been marred by widespread human rights abuses, with her security forces accused of extrajudicial killings, laws curtailing press and civic freedoms, and a ruthless crackdown on the opposition.

The Awami League faces few or no effective rivals in the seats it is contesting but has not fielded candidates for a small minority of seats, an apparent effort to avoid the legislature being branded a one-party institution.

Many young voters say they have no intention of participating in a contest they see as lacking a genuine choice.

“I´m not wasting my time for a one-sided election,” computer science graduate Sohanur Rahman, 28, told AFP in Dhaka.

The main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and other parties staged a series of rallies last year demanding Hasina step down in favour of a neutral caretaker government to oversee Sunday´s vote.