Bangladesh President Mohammed Shahabuddin has resigned, citing health reasons, ahead of his full five-year term, which would expire in 2028, amid rising demand from the opposition parties for him to step down.
“I am seriously ill. […] Therefore, I am unable to perform my duty of the constitutional post,” Shahabuddin, 76, said in a letter to the national parliament speaker on Friday.
Parliament Speaker Hafiz Uddin Ahmed said he accepted his resignation.
Ahmed will take the duty as interim president of Bangladesh, and a new president must be elected within the next 90 days, according to the constitution.
The resignation has come amid media reports that Shahabuddin spoke on the phone with the ousted Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who is living in India, during a visit by the former to the UK for medical treatment in May this year, according to Dhaka-based The Daily Star.
Shahabuddin has refuted the media report.
“I am suffering from various health complications,” he told The Daily Star when asked about the reason for his resignation. “I have nothing more to add at this moment."
He had travelled to London on May 9 and returned on May 18.
BNP set to succeed
Hasina, leader of the banned Awami League party, was ousted from office at the peak of a student-led uprising in the summer of 2024. She fled to India and has said she will return home, where she is on death sentence for civilian killings, later this year.
The members of parliament elect the president of Bangladesh.
The ruling Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) has a majority of lawmakers. As a result, the party's nominee is more likely to be elected the next president.
In April 2023, during Hasina’s Awami League government, Shahabuddin took over as the 22nd president of the country for a five-year term.
Accordingly, his term was supposed to end in April 2028. However, he resigned almost two and a half years before the end of the term.
Since the fall of Hasina's government in the mass uprising in July 2024, there has been a rising demand for Shahabuddin's resignation.
