The End of Sheikh Hasina’s Era: Is women leadership in Bangladesh at risk?

Two weeks before, I talked to my 85-year-old grandma (I call her nanu) over the phone. I was asking her how she felt about the former prime minister of Bangladesh, Sheikh Hasina, who fled to India after a mass uprising against her regime in Bangladesh on August 5^th, 2024. Awami League (AL), Hasina’s political party, is known as the ‘pro-liberation war party’ of Bangladesh, and that’s perhaps one of the reasons why Nanu, like many people in Bangladesh, supported AL. During the liberation war in 1971, Nanu and her family helped freedom fighters and have possibly voted for AL ever since.  Now, since the AL-led government headed by Hasina is accused of killing civilians during the mass uprising in July and August 2024, even Nanu thinks, ‘Hasina did massive injustice to the people’. But what really struck me during our conversation was when she added, ‘The female era is over, and I am happy that a man will now lead the country’. My Nanu mentioned the Nobel laureate Professor Dr. Muhammad Yunus, the new chief of the interim government formed after the resignation of Sheikh Hasina.

Even before that conversation with Nanu, I could feel that people in Bangladesh have mixed reactions to women leading the country. During the time of the formation of the interim government, I shared my expectations for an inclusionary formation of the interim government on Facebook. I wrote: ‘We need the representation of women, youth, and Indigenous communities in the interim government: inclusivity is power, diversity is beautiful.’ Beside some supports, some of my social media contacts expressed their anger at Sheikh Hasina, as well as Khaleda Zia, another former female prime minister in Bangladesh. Someone commented on my post, ‘These two women (former prime minister Sheikh Hasina and Khaleda Zia) consistently mislead the country for over 30 years, making Bangladesh a real hell.’

Women’s political leadership in Bangladesh is an iconic example, with longest-serving female prime ministers since 1991, except for small interruptions. Sheikh Hasina, known as the world’s longest-serving female prime minister, was in power for 15 consecutive years (2009-2024) and was running her fourth term when she resigned. The other large party, called the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), is also led by a woman, Khaleda Zia. She has also served as prime minister in two terms, from 1991-1996 and 2001-2006.

Bangladesh has a population of 170 million people and is the fourth largest Muslim-populated country in the world. Majority of the population, approximately 90%, are Muslim. Such long women leadership served as an exceptional example to the world, particularly to nations with significant Muslim populations. Women’s leadership in Islam is often contested and debated, as was reflected in Bangladesh in different incidents. The identity of Bengali Muslims is complex, rather little different than many other Muslim countries as it’s intertwined with secular beliefs as well as (some) Islamic values. On top of that, the society runs with strong patriarchal and heteronormative values. All these dynamics interest me, as a citizen of Bangladesh and as a feminist myself, to see how these women leaders in Bangladesh got mandated over decades and at the same time, how such leadership at the top of the hierarchy is sustained - even though women leadership frequently faced challenges in Bangladesh.

Both top female leaders I mentioned have a strong political family tie. For example, Hasina’s father was the founding leader of independent Bangladesh, while Khaleda’s husband founded the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP). This legacy played a crucial role in enabling them to lead major political parties in Bangladesh and eventually serve as heads of state. However, it is also undeniable that they employed their own strategies to effectively lead these large political parties and govern the country.

I was never entirely sure whether the people of Bangladesh truly wanted these two female leaders in power. Growing up, I noticed that some Bangladeshis seemed to have reservations about women leading the country. My late grandfather, for example, once told me he had never voted for a woman in his life. He believed women couldn't be leaders, a sentiment likely shared by many Islamists. Yet, we also see major Islamist parties allying with both Hasina and Khaleda to accumulate power. My grandfather’s view, which initially shocked me, quickly made sense when I realized it stemmed from deeply patriarchal-Islamic beliefs. Now, after Bangladesh has been led by women for so many years, I assumed that the acceptance of female leadership had become more normalized. While Hasina is often criticized for her unlawful and authoritarian actions, I've noticed that many Bangladeshis also point to her ‘gender’ as a factor in their criticism.

Bangladesh does not only experience the longest-serving women leadership, but the country is also doing better in the gender equality index (71st among 146 countries) and is ahead of all its South Asian neighbours. We also saw women to be in higher cabinet and administrative positions in past decades, which is often facilitated by a quota system. All of these facts can be interpreted as a good sign in terms of gender equality. Nonetheless, my experience of conducting research on gender issues in the past decade shows that only appointing women in different positions does not necessarily bring a gender transformative change. Women frequently operate within patriarchal and neoliberal logic, inadvertently reinforcing patriarchal and capitalist structures rather than challenging them.

This is relevant to the discussion about Hasina's recent departure. With an immediate reaction about Hasina, she carries positive indicators of woman leadership by serving the longest terms in Bangladesh. Her gender policies also helped lift women to different top positions as well as increase the percentage of girl’s enrollment in education. However, her authoritarian regime is now accused of killing hundreds of civilians, and children in the last month. Her regime has a record of extrajudicial killing and enforced disappearance of civilians in past years. Corruption, looting, and money laundering against her government are already evident in many global press and institutions. Over decades, she has made Bangladesh a ‘one party-one person’ state without accountability and democratic practice. Youth in Bangladesh, who are one thirds of the total population, are frustrated because they could never vote in the last three elections. Hasina made sure elections were fake, so she could keep her regime. People seem to be angry with her and her authoritarian corrupted regime. This angry reaction resulted in a mass uprising against the Hasina regime in early August 2024, which started with peaceful student mobilizations in July demanding for  ‘quota reform’ in the civil service examination of Bangladesh. During their early demonstrations at Dhaka University, the Bangladesh Chatra League (BCL), Bangladesh Awami League's student allies, and law enforcement agencies disrupted the peaceful protest by beating and killing innocent students, civilians and children. Nearly 650 people have been killed in the recent unrest in Bangladesh between July 16 and Aug 11, as reported by the UN. Although the quota issue was resolved in the Supreme Court, students kept protesting for justice for their fellow brothers and sisters who were killed and made Hasina resign and leave the country on 5^th August. 

The other female leader, Khaleda Zia, was also accused of corruption, extra judiciary killing, and money laundering during her two terms serving as a prime minister. I will not go into details, but what I mentioned above puts Bangladesh at risk of its democratic process with unaccountable governance. This could probably be the reason why even now some people in Bangladesh don’t perceive women leaders as positive. On the other hand, the interim chief Professor Dr. Yunus, known as the ‘banker of the poor’ supported millions of women in Bangladesh and across the world with micro-credit systems in the past decades. Students and ordinary people probably believe in his vision of gender equality, but he is not elected by the people. Bangladesh needs to find a next leader to be elected democratically in the near soon.

In such a transition moment, the people’s growing (hatred and) mistrust of women leadership in different social media platforms is alarming. Such contrasting political scenarios raise the question, of whether people are angry with these two female leaders or women leadership in general. Whether the misuse of power conducted by these female leaders put women’s leadership a risk? Will future women leaders bear the cost of acts done by Hasina or Khaleda? Which direction, then, is Bangladesh taking in terms of female leadership?