Jahid Hasan
Freelance Journalist
Bangladesh’s democratic renewal following the 13th parliamentary elections of February 2026 will remain incomplete until governance reaches its most immediate level, the union parishad, the pourashava, the upazila, and the city corporation. These are the institutions through which most citizens encounter the state in their daily lives, through roads, water, sanitation, birth registration, and local justice. After years in which local government was hollowed out by partisan capture, institutional neglect, and electoral violence, the government’s stated commitment to hold local government elections before the end of 2026 represents both an opportunity and a test. Whether that opportunity is seized or squandered will depend almost entirely on the quality of the legislative and electoral reforms that preceded the polls.
Restoring Non-Partisan Elections
The most consequential reform already underway is the restoration of non-partisan local elections. The Awami League government’s 2015 decision to permit party symbols in local elections transformed what had historically been community-based contests into extensions of national political rivalry. The consequences were predictable and severe: violence, intimidation, weakened local representation, and the subordination of community needs to party loyalty. Parliament’s April 2026 reversal of this provision is correct and necessary. However, restoring the legal framework is not sufficient. Political parties must be formally required by law to refrain from backing, financing, or publicly endorsing specific candidates in local government races. Non-partisan elections that are partisan in practice offer only the appearance of reform.
Legislating a Uniform Electoral Framework
Bangladesh currently operates five separate legal instruments governing its five tiers of local government, namely union parishads, upazila parishads, zila parishads, pourashavas, and city corporations. This fragmentation produces inconsistent rules, overlapping jurisdictions, and scheduling inefficiencies that inflate costs and dilute accountability. The Local Government Reform Commission has drafted a unified law consolidating these instruments, and the new government should prioritise its review and passage before elections are announced. A single, coherent law covering all tiers would also enable simultaneous elections across all local institutions, an arrangement estimated to reduce total electoral expenditure to approximately one-quarter of its current level while ensuring that all local bodies commence their terms in coordination.
Reforming Ward Structures and Representation
The current ward architecture of union parishads does not reflect demographic or geographic reality. Unions vary in population from approximately four thousand to four hundred thousand residents yet are uniformly divided into nine wards. This produces grotesque disparities in representation, with some ward members covering areas of hundreds of square kilometres while others serve densely packed urban settlements. Legislation must introduce population and area-based ward delimitation, with union parishads structured to contain wards of approximately twelve hundred to fifteen hundred residents each. Similarly, upazila and zila parishads should be reorganised around clearly defined electoral wards to eliminate the current indirect selection model that creates accountability gaps and disempowers local constituents.
Strengthening Women’s Electoral Participation
The reserved seat system for women in local government has underperformed its democratic intention. Female members elected to three-ward constituencies share jurisdictional space with male ward members, diluting their authority and marginalising their role in decision-making. Legislation should replace this arrangement with a rotational reservation system under which thirty percent of all wards across each local government institution are reserved for women candidates on a rotating basis across election cycles. This approach ensures genuine representation with direct ward mandates rather than secondary status within overlapping constituencies.
Electoral Administration and Conduct Rules
The Election Commission’s proposed regulatory changes, including the abolition of campaign posters, removal of Electronic Voting Machine provisions, the withdrawal of the one-percent voter signature requirement for independent candidates, and disqualification of fugitive accused persons from contesting, are sound operational reforms that should be codified in law rather than left as administrative rules susceptible to future revision. The Commission has itself identified four institutional conditions essential to credible polls: genuine government neutrality, responsible conduct by political parties, an uncompromising Election Commission, and honest electoral officials at every level. Each of these conditions requires not good faith alone but enforceable legal obligations with real consequences for violations.
Local government is where democracy is lived. The reforms described above are not procedural luxuries. They are the structural foundations without which no local election, however technically administered, can restore the trust that years of partisan misrule have eroded.
