IBNS-CMEDIA: Bangladesh’s political transition in August 2024 may have involved behind-the-scenes discussions about a successor to Sheikh Hasina before she left the country, according to claims by Shafiqul Alam, the former press secretary to interim government chief adviser Muhammad Yunus.
In a Facebook post, Alam alleged that student leaders approached Nobel Peace Prize laureate Yunus two days before Hasina’s ouster on August 5, 2024, to invite him to lead a proposed interim administration.
He also identified Qadaruddin Shishir, then an editor with Agence France-Presse’s (AFP) Dhaka fact-check team, as the intermediary who allegedly facilitated the initial contact.
Alam’s account offers a description of the discussions that preceded one of Bangladesh’s most significant political upheavals in recent years.
However, the allegations in the post do not, by themselves, establish the full extent of the planning or the involvement of those named.
Yunus aide describes secret talks
Alam claimed that the student leaders seeking to approach Yunus needed a trusted intermediary to establish contact with the Nobel laureate.
“When student leaders wanted to reach out to Nobel Laureate Professor Muhammad Yunus and invite him to head the interim government in a post-Hasina scenario, they needed a trusted bridge-builder.
Qadaruddin Shishir stepped up to fulfil that critical role,” Alam wrote.
He alleged that Shishir handled the operation in secrecy and initiated contact with Yunus on behalf of the student leaders.
“Only a select few trusted individuals knew what was happening. It was Shishir who first approached the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize winner on behalf of the student leaders and facilitated the initial talks between the two parties,” Alam said.
According to the former press secretary, the meeting took place two days before Hasina left Bangladesh on August 5, 2024.
His account suggests that discussions about the leadership of a possible post-Hasina administration were already under way while her government remained in power.
Alam further claimed that the discussions escaped the attention of the security establishment until Hasina’s departure.
“Hasina would remain in power for two more days, yet her brutal security machine—notorious for mass killings and abductions—never caught a whisper of it. Had they discovered what was happening, Shishir and our entire AFP team would likely have ended up in an Aynaghar (house of mirrors secret prison),” he wrote.
The post also praised Shishir’s composure during the period.
Alam claimed that the journalist quietly began collecting video evidence of killings allegedly committed by the government.
The claims about the planning, the intermediary’s role and the alleged collection of evidence have not been independently established in the account provided.
How Hasina lost power in August 2024
Hasina left Bangladesh on August 5, 2024, following weeks of student-led protests that escalated into a wider political crisis.
The demonstrations began over a government job-quota system before expanding into a broader movement against her administration.
Yunus took charge as chief adviser of the interim government on August 8, 2024.
The administration remained in office for approximately a year and a half, overseeing a period marked by political confrontation, legal proceedings against former government figures and disputes over accountability for the violence surrounding Hasina’s removal.
In 2025, a special tribunal tried Hasina in absentia and sentenced her to death.
The interim administration also disbanded her Awami League party and sought her extradition from India.
These developments intensified the political divide between Hasina’s supporters and the authorities that took over after her departure.
Hasina accuses Yunus of political repression
Hasina has accused the Yunus-led administration of failing to hold those responsible for violence accountable while pursuing cases against Awami League members for political reasons.
She has also alleged that political repression and a climate of fear continued under the arrangements that followed her removal from office.
The competing claims have remained central to the debate over Bangladesh’s post-2024 political transition, with Hasina’s supporters challenging the legitimacy and conduct of the interim administration.
Alam’s account adds another element to that debate by alleging that discussions about a possible successor to Hasina began before she left the country.
His post places Yunus’s selection within a sequence of contacts involving student leaders and an AFP journalist, although it does not provide independent documentation establishing all the details of those discussions.
Yunus heckled at NY airport
Yunus also faced a public confrontation during a visit to the United States, when a group described in reports as supporters of the disbanded Awami League heckled him at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport.
A video of the incident circulated online, showing protesters shouting accusations as Yunus was escorted through the terminal.
“You are a terrorist, murderer!” and “Why you come here?” protesters were heard shouting in the footage.
Muhammad Yunus has been spotted at JFK airport, New york. “You, terrorist why did you come here. You have destroyed the democracy in my country!” https://t.co/SjUMUc7WIg
— subash kumar (@Krishan10_) October 13, 2026
Another voice accused him of responsibility for the deaths of police officers in Bangladesh, saying: “You killed thousands of police officers in my country”.
The footage showed Yunus’s escort turning his wheelchair around inside the terminal amid the verbal confrontation.
The incident illustrated the continuing hostility surrounding Yunus and the political changes that followed Hasina’s departure.
