A “second liberation day”. That is how Muhammad Yunus, Nobel peace laureate, hailed the moment when Bangladesh’s autocratic prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, fled by helicopter on Monday amid a huge uprising. Now the 84-year-old microfinance pioneer is to head the country’s interim government.
Mr Yunus, who is due to arrive home from France on Thursday, has called for elections within months. Though Bangladesh went to the polls in January, the last credible, truly competitive election was in 2008. The students who led the protests against the toppled government had no chance to cast a meaningful vote. Turnout this year was rock bottom, with the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist party (BNP) once more boycotting the contest. To no one’s surprise, Sheikh Hasina’s Awami League won a fourth consecutive term.
