Sleep for only 5 hours daily to run the country: Hasina

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Bangla Tribune Desk
Published : 23:54, Sep 11, 2019 | Updated : 00:54, Sep 12, 2019

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina speaking during a question/answer session at the Parliament on Wednesday (Sept 11). PHOTO: Focus BanglaPrime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who the US-based Time magazine described "has never been afraid of a fight", said she can't sleep no more than 5 hours daily to guard "the good and bad" of her people.
“I’m not running the country by sleeping and I don’t wake from sleep at 12 noon. Out of 24 hours, I sleep for only 5 hours. During the remaining hours, I always try to keep vigilance that what happens where … I think it’s my responsibility,” Hasina was quoted by state news agency BSS as saying.
The 71-year-old lady, who was named in Time's 100 world's most influential people for 2018 for accepting the thousands of Rohingya refugees who fled persecution by the Myanmar army, revealed part of her daily routines during a parliament session in Dhaka on Wednesday (Sept 11).
“As the people have sent me to parliament and I have taken the responsibility as the prime minister, I always think that it’s my duty to look after the good and bad of the people,” said Hasina who has been in power since 2009.
Considered as one of the most powerful women in the world, she ranked 26th in Forbes' list of The World's 100 Most Powerful Women in 2018 and 30th in 2017. She also made to the list of top 100 Global Thinkers of the present decade released by US-based Foreign Policy.
A daughter of the founder of Bangladesh, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Hasina has a long political career. She led the historic mass movement by the late 1980s to topple then military regime of HM Ershad.
After a long break since the birth of Bangladesh in 1971, her party Awami League formed government in 1996 with Hasina becoming the prime minister for the first time.
"A staunch crusader against fundamentalism, militancy and terrorism," Hasina led AL to win a two-third majority in the December 2008 election and become the prime minister for the second time on Jan 6, 2009.
Under her leadership over the past decade, Bangladesh's annual growth rose to 8.13 percent in the 2018/19 financial year, compared with 5.1 percent when Hasina took over in 2008/09. Per capita income also nears $2,000.
Hasina also led Bangladesh to become eligible to move out of the list of Least Developed Countries (LDCs) to a developing nation. British influential magazine Economist described Bangladesh as the "role model for South Asia" and analysts often called the country as the "new Asian Tiger".

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