Islamist united front for proportional representation in BD?

Jamaat Ameer Dr Shafiqur Rahman waving at the crowd.

The Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami in their grand rally at the Suhrawardy Udyan on Saturday voiced the demand for proportional representation in the forthcoming national elections slated for the first quarter of 2026.

This is the second showdown on this new demand, first one made by the Islami Andolan Bangladesh on June 28 last making it a joint bargain of the prominent Islamist political parties in the country.

A 7-point demand voiced by Jamaat at Saturday's  rally also includes the demand for visible trial of the July 2024 killings perpetrated before the mass upsurge of August 05.

The newly formed National Citizens' Party (NCP) and the Nagorik Odhikar Party of Nur Hossain Nur are also votaries of PR system of election. Other Islamist parties including the Islami Khelafat Majlis want a mixed system of elections, constituency-based polls for the lower house and PR system for the upper house institution of which is under active consideration. 

The demand for proportional representation in national elections is new in Bangladesh and is opposed by other key stake holders including the main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party on the ground that this will disconnect elected representatives from the voters.

Another point mentioned by opponents to the demand is that it would reward the political parties that stand discredited because of autocratic and oppressive rule of the past 15 plus years. Again who will become MPs will be dependent on the choices of the central leaders of the parties. The key advantage of PR voting will be the avoidance of electoral violence and a fair chance to avoid vote rigging provided the administration and the EC play an impartial role. 

The main difficulty to introduce PR is, neither the voters nor the Election Commission are familiar with the system. The leader of an Islamist party told GreenWatch Dhaka that it will take time for the people and the parties to become familiar with the PR system practiced in Nepal and Sri Lanka.

A defensive strategy like the stand for caretaker government to hold elections of the minority party of Jamaat way back in the 1990s, it is yet to prove how they will benefit from it. The caretaker system did not benefit Jamaat in 1996 when its share of elected seats came down from 18 to 3. The system however increased the credibility of three successive national elections of 1991, 1996 and 2001.