NEW DELHI, August 20. /TASS/. General Secretary of the ruling Bangladesh Nationalist Party, 78-year-old Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir has been elected the country’s new president, according to the parliamentary vote.

His only rival was Oli Ahmad, chairman of the Liberal Democratic Party, who was nominated by a coalition of 11 parties led by Jamaat-e-Islami.

According to chief commissioner of the election commission Nasir Uddin, Alamgir received 255 votes, while Ahmad received 88. The new president will be sworn in on Friday evening.

For the first time in Bangladesh, presidential elections were held through direct voting by parliamentarians, who cast their ballots into the ballot boxes. The election commission approved the list of voters, which included 349 legislators. Of these, 247 are deputies from the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, and 90 represent the opposition coalition. Six parliamentarians did not participate in the voting.

Bangladeshi President Shahabuddin Chuppu, who was elected head of state in 2023, resigned on July 24 for health reasons. According to the constitution, elections for a new president must be held within 90 days by a vote of the members of parliament. At present, the presidential duties are being temporarily carried out by Parliament Speaker Hafiz Uddin Ahmad.

The president of Bangladesh is the head of state, but his powers are mainly ceremonial. Executive power is concentrated in the hands of the prime minister and the government. As a rule, the president acts on their advice and does not make independent political decisions.