Dhaka: Tarique Rahman was sworn in as Bangladesh’s new Prime Minister on Tuesday in a ceremony held at the South Plaza of Jatiya Sangsad Bhaban. Mohammed Shahabuddin administered the oath at around 4:15 pm local time.
The event, hosted at the National Parliament complex’s South Plaza, was arranged to accommodate nearly 1,200 guests. Alongside Rahman, 25 lawmakers from the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) were sworn in as cabinet ministers, while 24 other newly elected Members of Parliament took oath as state ministers.
In the recently concluded 13th Parliamentary elections, the BNP secured a commanding majority by winning 209 of the 297 seats. The right-wing Jamaat-e-Islami won 68 seats. The Awami League, led by former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, was barred from contesting the polls.
Earlier in the day, Chief Election Commissioner AMM Nasir Uddin administered the oath to all 297 newly elected members of the 13th Jatiya Sangsad. According to a parliamentary secretariat release, lawmakers first took oath as Members of Parliament and subsequently as members of the Constitutional Reform Council.
The BNP has scheduled a parliamentary party meeting at the Parliament Building to formally elect its parliamentary leader. BNP standing committee member Salah Uddin Ahmed said that as leader of the majority party, Tarique Rahman would assume the office of Prime Minister.
