Name: Bangladesh’s election sees historic drop in female candidates | DW News
Uploaded: 2026-02-10T17:30:35.000Z
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Now to Bangladesh, which is holding elections in two days.

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For the first time in decades, no major party is led to the polls by a woman.

Women make up half of Bangladesh's voters, but less than 5% of the candidates.

Despite a new generation of women entering politics, the gap between voters and power appears to be widening.

Sumay alum Leera is campaigning for the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, the pnp.

It is the party which gave the country its first woman prime minister.

More women are going to schools, colleges and universities today because women were in leadership positions over the past decades.

I'm not sure I would be standing here speaking to you if only men had held those positions.

Leaders ambitions are still taking shape.

But despite its history, Bangladesh's political structure offers little encouragement to women.

For 35 years, women led the top positions in Bangladeshi political power.

They were prime ministers, party chiefs, and behind the scenes power brokers.

But now, for the first time in decades, no major party is being led into the election by a woman.

Despite that history, the issue of women's representation is structural and chronic.

Decades of women led governments, improved education and health, but did little for women's political power.

Women have historically held less than one in five parliamentary seats, and

many of those are reserved and filled by party nomination.

In direct contests, women usually make up less than 5% of candidates for and a gap that reform promises after the uprising have failed to close.

This failure frustrates Taslim Akhtar, a candidate from the Gonushanghuti Andolon, a party with progressive ideas.

During the uprising, we fought against fascism, but we did not break free from its culture.

We still haven't reached a point where the state or political parties see women and men as equals.

Nominating more women candidates could have a powerful answer to that, but it didn't happen this time.

And the way political parties have failed to nominate us has left many of us feeling disappointed.

The imbalance is compounded by another reality.

Nearly a third of women candidates are related to male political leaders, rather than being independent political actors.

On top of that, Islamists have become a major force in this election and and they are against women leadership.

Shirin Parvin Hawk recently led the interim government's reform commission on women's issues.

In this country, 51% are women, so their broader representation is a must.

But if we expect that more women in the parliament means everything will change fundamentally, that might not be the case.

But more visibility of women and Then being part of different parliamentary committees is very important.

Back on campus, Lira knows she has to take it one step at a time.

She hopes the path ahead will be wider for women like her and those who follow.

More on this, we can speak now with our special correspondent Namisha Jai Spoiler.

Misha, Bangladeshi women played a central part in the 2024 uprising.

Why is their political participation so limited now at this critical point just ahead of the election?

Well, Tariq, of all the women that I've been speaking to in my time here, they have repeatedly said that despite their hopes that the revolution would bring a more equitable environment for women to participate politically, that has not been the case.

And one of the other things that I've heard repeatedly is that cyberbullying is playing a huge role in that there are massive online hate campaigns being mounted against women activists as well as women politicians.

And, and this is still a somewhat conservative society.

So, for example, modified images off of AI are even being used to slander women that are taking up public space.

Now, it is important to note that even though we keep talking about how Bangladesh has been ruled by a woman for over 30 years, both those women, former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and Khalid Aziya, had familial connections to politics.

This does give a certain degree of protection.

And the election commission here has found that in the past as well, the women who ran the were more likely to win if they had familial connections or male relatives in politics.

But even those women that we've spoken to who have these relatives say they are not safe from online hate campaigns.

What arguments are the major political parties giving for not prioritizing women representation more?

Well, Terry, when you ask these parties, they say that they are prioritizing women.

For example, one of the leading parties, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, the bnp, says that it promises that women will be a bigger part of policymaking in the future if it wins.

But they're only fielding 10 women candidates.

That's less than 4% of the total candidates they're fielding.

And even then, the BNP is one of the parties that's fielding the highest number of candidates.

Now, when we look at the other leading party, the Jamaati Islami, they haven't fielded a single woman candidate.

And that among 30 parties that have not fielded any women candidates at all.

Now, the leader of the Jamaat Eslami is also raising a lot of controversy for allegedly misogynistic comments.

He made an online statement about working women, equating them to prostitutes.

That statement was taken down, the alleged hacking.

But it has raised enough shackles here that women's rights activists have gone to the election commission asking for him to be disqualified.

This is of course, unlikely to happen, but

alliance partners of the Jamaat, including the Youth Party that came out of the revolution, have actually lost women candidates thanks to the fact that they allied with the Jamati Islami.

Now, some women candidates have decided to run as independents.

I understand is that because of disappointment with established political parties.

That does seem to be a safe assumption to make, Terry.

17 of the 78 women candidates running in this election are running as independents.

And several of them have left behind other major parties saying that they're disappointed with the old guard, that they were hoping that after the Youth Revolution, the old guard would not really be the dominant force and there'll be a new structure and they do not find their ideals aligning with these parties.

One of these independents that we spoke to left the Youth Party to contest the elections as an independent after its alliance with Jamaat, like I mentioned.

But many others who left the Youth Party decided not to contest this election because they were disappointed and they hope to enter politics later on.

But they feel like this is not the time thanks to the fact that the old structures, despite the revolution, seem to still be dominant.

How big of a concern is the lack of women candidates for them in this election?

It's definitely really high on the minds of all the women I've been talking to here, Terry.

It does not seem to be that dominant, perhaps among some of the men I've been talking to on the ground.

But several of the especially young women.

They told me that they really wanted to choose a woman candidate.

They really, they were excited about voting for the first time in what they see as a free and fair election, over 41 million first time voters.

But they said they don't even have a woman available on that list.

And another reminder that I keep Getting is that 51% of the population's women, women make up a huge part of the workforce, especially the textile industry, but

And women have said that until both online and offline spaces are made safer for women, Bangladesh is giving up a huge economic dividend.

That was DW special correspondent Namisha Jaisw.

Well, for more, I'm joined now by Sohela Nazni.

She is with Britain's Institute of Development Studies, where she focuses on gender politics and women's empowerment in South Asia that includes Bangladesh.

Ms. Nazni, it's good to have you on the program.

I'll start by asking you why are we seeing such a low number of women candidates in Bangladesh at the moment?

There are three reasons behind this and it is, as your report sort of shows, it is quite surprising for a country that has been led by women and women are in all other sectors of the society and economy.

And these three reasons are first is the institutional design of the electoral system.

And I will come to that and explain why that is, that you have fewer numbers.

The second is basically how political parties look at women candidates and the possibilities of women being nominated by the parties.

And the third is the misogyny that exists in politics and the violence and harassment that women candidates face that basically discourages them from running.

Coming to the first point, which is about the electoral system and its design.

So we know that parties were asked to nominate at least 5% of the potential candidates that be women.

Now, there's no sanction for not meeting this threshold.

And none of the political parties, whether that's the center right Bangladesh Nationalist Party or, or Jama', at, which is the Islamist party or the new student led party, has met that threshold.

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Bangladesh’s election sees historic drop in female candidates | DW News

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