President Md Sahabuddin has resigned from the office of president over ill health. He sent his resignation letter to the Speaker of the Jatiya Sangsad on Friday. Accepting his resignation letter, Speaker Hafiz Uddin Ahmed has taken over as acting president.
He announced that he was taking over as president at a press conference held at the Jatiya Sangsad secretariat at about 5:30 p.m. on Friday.
Announcing Md Sahabuddin’s resignation from the presidency, Hafiz Uddin Ahmed said: “Under article 54 of the constitution, I am taking over as president. I have accepted the resignation letter, and instructions have been given for it to be preserved at the Jatiya Sangsad secretariat and for the necessary administrative steps to be taken.”
He said: “In the constitution, as you may already know, on the day I took the oath as Speaker, I also took the oath as acting president, for if the need arises. In the same way our Deputy Speaker, when he takes the oath as Deputy Speaker, it is stated that whenever the need arises and the Speaker’s chair is vacant for any reason, the Deputy Speaker will discharge the Speaker’s duties.”
Md Sahabuddin was elected president unopposed in 2023 on the Awami League’s nomination. He took the oath on April 24 that year. Had he not resigned, his five-year term was to end in April 2028.
In an interview with the news agency Reuters on December 11, 2025, Md Sahabuddin had expressed a wish to step aside after the February parliamentary election. He said then: “I am keen to take my leave. I want to go away from here.”
Although the BNP formed the government with an absolute majority in the February 12 election, the president did not resign then. On February 17, Prime Minister Tarique Rahman and the ministers and state ministers of the new government took their oaths before him. In an interview published on February 23, highlighting the BNP’s support during the interim government, the president said: “In my difficult time the BNP’s cooperation was one hundred percent. The BNP’s top leadership stood by it in protecting constitutional continuity.”
Demands to remove Md Sahabuddin from the presidency had been raised first during the interim government and later under the BNP government.
বাংলায় মূল প্রতিবেদন পড়ুন · Read the original Bengali report