Khaleda Zia, who became Bangladesh’s first female prime minister in 1991 and went on to develop a bitter rivalry with Sheikh Hasina as they spent decades trading power, died on Tuesday after a long illness. She was 80. Her opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) said that she died after a prolonged illness.
She had advanced cirrhosis of the liver, arthritis, diabetes, and chest and heart problems, her doctors said. She went to London for medical treatment in early 2025, staying for four months before returning home. Though Khaleda had been out of power since 2006 and had spent several years in jail or under house arrest, she and her centre-right BNP continued to command much support.
The BNP is seen as the frontrunner to win the parliamentary election slated to take place in February. Her son and acting chairman of the party, Tarique Rahman, 60, returned to the country last week from nearly 17 years in self-exile and is widely seen as a strong candidate to become prime minister. Since August 2024, after a student-led uprising led to the ouster of Hasina, Bangladesh has been run by an interim government headed by Muhammad Yunus, the Nobel peace laureate and microfinance pioneer.
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In November, Hasina was sentenced to death in absentia for her deadly crackdown on the student protests. Known by her first name, Khaleda was described as shy and devoted to raising her two sons until her husband, military leader and then-President Ziaur Rahman, was assassinated in an attempted army coup in 1981. Three years later she became the head of the BNP, which her husband had founded, and vowed to deliver on his aim of “liberating Bangladesh from poverty and economic backwardness”.
But their cooperation did not last long. Their bitter rivalry would lead to the two being dubbed “the battling Begums” – a phrase that uses an Urdu honorific for prominent women. Supporters saw her as polite and traditional yet quietly stylish, someone who chose her words carefully. But they also viewed her as a bold, uncompromising leader when it came to defending her party and confronting her rivals.
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