Election legitimacy and the absence of Awami League

Apart from Bangladeshis’ understandable preoccupation right now with the question of who will win the election—BNP or Jamaat-e-Islami—there are two further common points of contention that people are asking about the February 12 vote.

First, will there be any manipulation of votes, as has occurred to varying degrees in every election in Bangladesh, or will the result genuinely reflect how people voted? Second, a question few are willing to ask within Bangladesh itself, but which is raised more openly outside the country: can an election be considered fair and legitimate in the absence of the Awami League? 

This article is primarily concerned with the second question, although a brief comment on the issue of electoral manipulation is warranted. There is little doubt that nefarious actors exist—at both local and national levels—within both major party blocs, as well as within the administration and the security forces, who, if given the opportunity, may seek to tilt the electoral process in favour of one side or the other. 

While the government insists that this will be the cleanest election in the country’s history, it remains uncertain whether sufficient safeguards and scrutiny are in place—within the Election Commission, among observers, or in the media—to prevent rigging. Ultimately, this is something that can only be judged on the day itself and in subsequent reporting. That said, it seems likely that any manipulation, should it occur, will be relatively limited in scope.

However, even assuming that there is no rigging, or no substantive rigging, there remains the question of whether the election can be described as “fair” or legitimate in the absence of the Awami League. 

In principle, any genuinely fair election should allow the participation of all political parties, and throughout Bangladesh’s history, the Awami League has consistently been either the most popular or the second most popular party. Even now, were it permitted to contest the election, the Awami League would almost certainly win a number of seats, though it would not get close to securing a victory. Its participation would nonetheless likely have a decisive impact on the overall result, shaping which of the other parties emerged on top and potentially allowing the Awami League to hold the balance of power. In short, an election that included the Awami League would look markedly different from the one scheduled to take place in just over a week’s time.

It is this line of reasoning that underpins the Awami League’s claim that its exclusion from the election is wholly unjustifiable and renders the result illegitimate. 

 In advancing this argument, however, the Awami League ignores the context in which the decision to exclude it was taken. That context is the party’s role in supporting—and in key respects, facilitating—the government’s response to the July 2024 protests during which, as per detailed mapping of the killings cited by the International Truth and Justice Project, over 800 individuals were confirmed to have been killed by law enforcement authorities. This is not a peripheral issue. It is the central reason why the party now finds itself outside the electoral process. This context is not merely ignored by the Awami League but is also often minimised or omitted by journalists and others sympathetic to the party’s current predicament.

The question is whether this is enough to justify the Awami League’s exclusion.

One way to approach this question is through a thought experiment: to consider how such events would be viewed, and what political consequences would likely follow, if they occurred in another democratic country, however unlikely that may seem. 

Imagine, then, that something similar happened in Britain.

The prime minister, Keir Starmer, orders the police and security forces to use lethal force against protesters. Over the course of several weeks, hundreds of people are killed and thousands seriously injured. Almost all Labour ministers, MPs, and senior party figures either publicly support the policy, remain silent, or conspicuously fail to criticise it. Starmer and other senior figures actively encourage local Labour constituency parties to mobilise in support of law enforcement. In some areas, Labour activists take to the streets in support of the security forces; some carry firearms and shoot at protesters.

When the UK army refuses to shoot on protesters, Starmer and a significant portion of the Labour leadership flee the country, taking refuge in France. The United Nations dispatches a fact-finding mission to the UK, which issues a report concluding that in support of the government, “violent elements associated with” the Labour Party systematically engaged in serious human rights violations, including “hundreds of extrajudicial killings.” Yet, over the following year and a half, neither Starmer nor any senior Labour figure, whether abroad or at home, acknowledges the party or government’s culpability; leaked recordings even suggest that Starmer, who remains leader of the Labour Party, is encouraging, from France, party activists inside the UK to continue using violence. 

If this were to happen in the UK—or in any other liberal democratic country—would the country’s political establishment allow the Labour Party to contest the next general election? It is extremely difficult to imagine that it would. The party would be widely regarded as having crossed fundamental democratic red lines and would not be allowed to contest. Only once the party had established an alternative leadership would you imagine the party being allowed to contest an election. 

If such conduct would justify excluding the Labour Party from an election in the UK, it is difficult to argue that Bangladesh’s authorities are now acting unreasonably in reaching the same conclusion with respect to the Awami League. There are circumstances in which the exclusion of a major political party from an election does not undermine the election’s legitimacy, but instead represents a response to conduct that has placed that party, at least temporarily, outside the bounds of democratic legitimacy. The Awami League’s response to the July uprising is one such circumstance.

It is true that Bangladesh has no shortage of highly partisan opponents of the Awami League who, for their own political purposes, exaggerate the extent to which the entire party—at national, district, and local levels—was complicit in the July killings. This overreach is reflected in the criminalising of Awami League activities and the arrest and imprisonment of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of the party’s members without supporting evidence. 

 These excesses are real, troubling, and must be acknowledged. But one need not accept the exaggerated claims or support the legal steps taken against the party to recognise the force of the more limited argument for why the Awami League, in its current form, should not be permitted to contest this election. Put differently, even allowing for exaggeration and abuse by its opponents, the core justification for the party’s exclusion remains intact. On that basis, an election held without the Awami League cannot be dismissed as illegitimate.

That said, Awami League’s exclusion is not cost-free. It distorts the electoral landscape in significant ways. A substantial portion of the electorate—long-standing Awami League supporters—are effectively disenfranchised, forced either to vote for parties they do not support or to abstain altogether. This reality cannot be wished away. Even if the party’s exclusion from the election is justified, its total absence is not healthy for the country. It benefits only the Awami League’s political opponents, not Bangladesh’s democratic development.

For this reason, one does not need to support the party to recognise that serious efforts should be made in the coming years to enable the emergence of a renewed Awami League: a party grounded in its historic commitments to 1971, secularism, and social liberalism, but led by a new leadership that has clearly and credibly broken with those directly responsible for the July killings. But a return to normal democratic competition will require the party to undertake its own process of accountability, reckoning, and reform. And it must be encouraged, as well as pressured, to do so.

If such a process is to be possible, the next elected government will have a crucial role to play. It must move away from some of the most damaging practices of the interim period, including the banning of Awami League’s party activities and the use of mass arrests and prolonged detention of its members without evidence. Only prosecutions supported by credible and sufficient evidence should proceed; all those currently detained without such evidence should be released. Those within the party who want to create a reformed Awami League cannot begin the difficult work of reckoning while a boot remains on the party’s neck.

David Bergman is a journalist who has written about Bangladesh for many years. His X handle is @TheDavidBergman.

Views expressed in this article are the author's own. 

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