BNP's Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir elected as Bangladesh's new President

DHAKA: Ruling Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) candidate Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir was on Thursday elected as the country's new President in the first contested poll for the post in 35 years.

Key points

• Alamgir secured 255 votes while Oli Ahmad bagged 88 votes, he remarked.
• The president-elect will take the oath as Bangladesh's new President on Friday evening at the Darbar Hall of Bangabhaban.
• As the office had largely been filled through consensus and uncontested polls in recent decades, it is the first contested presidential election in Bangladesh since 1991.
• Of the total 349 registered voters, 343 voted in the election.

Notably, the 78-year-old BNP stalwart defeated his rival Colonel (retd) Oli Ahmed, the Liberal Democratic Party chairman and the nominee of the Jamaat-e-Islami-led 11-party opposition alliance, Chief Election Commissioner and additionally Election Returning Officer AMM Nasir Uddin stated. Alamgir secured 255 votes while Oli Ahmad bagged 88 votes, he remarked.

Of the total 349 registered voters, 343 voted in the election. Six lawmakers didn't vote, he continued.

In practice, the president-elect will take the oath as Bangladesh's new President on Friday evening at the Darbar Hall of Bangabhaban.

For context, the presidential election was necessitated after Mohammed Shahabuddin, a close aide of deposed prime minister Sheikh Hasina, resigned last month on health grounds before completing his five-year tenure.

For now, bNP' s Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir elected as Bangladesh' s new President remains the part of the story worth watching, and further updates are likely as more details are confirmed.