Bangladeshi "elections", 2014

[Хahar 🤔]

Legislative elections are set to be held on January 5, but because of the Awami League's repeal of the requirement that a caretaker government hold elections all other major parties are boycotting. If and when there is governmental change, it will not be the result of a coup (the Bangladeshi military has not been nearly that crass for a long time now), but it is also unlikely to be the result of elections.

[Хahar 🤔]

Nobody should care (over half the seats were uncontested), but the Awami League won 231 of 300 seats, with almost all of the rest going to allies. Obviously this result has no legitimacy. It remains to be seen where things will go from here.

[MaxQue]

Does the boycott was legitimate, or it was because opposition was sure it couldn't win (like the Yellows in Thailand)?

[Хahar 🤔]

I don't think it makes sense to draw a meaningful distinction between the two. Bangladesh doesn't have democracy in any real sense; since democracy was nominally restored after the fall of Ershad, regime change has only happened following an election boycott or other unrest. The Awami League wasn't going to lose this election.

[MaxQue]

Thank you for the information, I must admit I know nothing about Bangladesh but cheap clothes factories, overpopulation, Gange flooding during the moosoon and Dacca being the capital.