2011 Turkish general election

Turkish general election, 2011

12 June 2011
All 550 seats of the Grand National Assembly of Turkey 276 seats are needed for a majority
Leader Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu Devlet Bahçeli Party AK Party CHP MHP Last election 341 112 76
Provinces of Turkey
Incumbent Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan AK Party

Turkey's 17th general election will be held on 12 June 2011. It will be Turkey's first non-early elections in 34 years.

Background

Following the 2010 constitutional referendum, AK party leaders said they would create a new constitution after the 2011 elections, which were seen as having emboldened the AK Party.

Polls

Main article: Opinion polling for the Turkish general election, 2011

In the local elections of 2009, the ruling AK Party received 39% of the votes. The second party CHP received 23% of the votes and the third party MHP received 16% of the votes. In the run up to the general election of 2011, the polling organisations noted a growth in popularity of the AK Party. Polling organisations show a rate between 42% and 50%. For CHP the numbers vary between 25% and 30%. MHP is mostly shown between 10% and 14%.

Electoral system

Date

On March 3, 2011, Parliament approved a ruling party proposal to set June 12 as the date for the general elections. The proposal was submitted by the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) on February 21 and was approved unanimously in the Parliament’s General Assembly. In its proposal, the AK Party pointed to the appropriateness of June 12 as the election date considering the June dates for the placement test for high schools (SBS) and the university entrance exam (ÖSS). The heat during the summer was also considered during the choice of date, aiming a high voter turnout.

Novelties

In accordance with a law approved by Parliament last year that made changes to Turkey’s election laws, Turkish voters are set to encounter some novelties during the general election of 2011. The changes aim to bring Turkish election campaign regulations up to European standards.

• The age for parliamentary eligibility is reduced from 30 to 25.
• Wooden ballot boxes are replaced by new ballot boxes made out of hard plastic that will be transparent, unbreakable and resistant to heat.
• Voting booths are upgraded to a stronger, safer, and more portable model.
• Voting envelopes will be made larger and will have different colors for each matter that is being voted upon.
• Campaigning in languages other than Turkish will not result in a jail sentence, paving the way for politicians to use Kurdish in their quest for votes.
• Campaigning will now be allowed until two hours after sunset. Under the previous law, campaigning after sundown was forbidden.
• Citizens will be able to vote without official identification as long as they can provide their identity number.
• Anyone who prevents someone from casting their vote will receive three to five years in prison.

Turkish voters living abroad will have to wait for another election to be able to cast their votes in the countries in which they are residing due to the inability to institute electronic voting. Turkish voters abroad will thus need to cast their votes at customs gates.

Regions

The number of MPs by province has been redistributed according to the most recent population data. The number of deputies in Parliament for Istanbul has been increased by 15, for Ankara by three and İzmir by two; Antalya, Diyarbakır, Van and Şırnak will each receive one more seat in Parliament. Ankara’s two regions will yield 15 and 16 deputies. Istanbul, made up of three regions, will have 30, 27 and 28 deputies. Izmir, with two regions, will have 13 deputies each from both regions.

The number of MPs by province
Adana 14 Adıyaman 5 Afyonkarahisar 6 Ağrı 4 Amasya 3 Ankara, region 1, 15 Ankara, region 2, 16 Antalya 13 Artvin 2 Aydın 7 Balıkesir 8 Bilecik 2	Bingöl 3 Bitlis 3 Bolu 3 Burdur 3 Bursa 17 Çanakkale 4 Çankırı 2 Çorum 4 Denizli 7 Diyarbakır 11 Edirne 4 Elazığ 5	Erzincan 2 Erzurum 6 Eskişehir 6 Gaziantep 12 Giresun 4 Gümüşhane 2 Hakkâri 3 Hatay 10 Isparta 4 Mersin 12 Istanbul, region 1, 30 Istanbul, region 2, 27	Istanbul, region 3, 28 Izmir, region 1, 13 Izmir, region 2, 13 Kars 3 Kastamonu 4 Kayseri 9 Kırklareli 3 Kırşehir 2 Kocaeli 11 Konya 14 Kütahya 5 Malatya 6	Manisa 10 Kahramanmaraş 8 Mardin 6 Muğla 6 Muş 4 Nevşehir 3 Niğde 3 Ordu 6 Rize 3 Sakarya 7 Samsun 9 Siirt 3	Sinop 2 Sivas 5 Tekirdağ 6 Tokat 5 Trabzon 6 Tunceli 2 Şanlıurfa 11 Uşak 3 Van 8 Yozgat 4 Zonguldak 5 Aksaray 3	Bayburt 2 Karaman 2 Kırıkkale 3 Batman 4 Şırnak 4 Bartın 2 Ardahan 2 Iğdır 2 Yalova 2 Karabük 2 Kilis 2 Osmaniye 4 Düzce 3

Campaign

Parties

On March 5, 2011, Turkey’s Supreme Election Board announced that twenty-seven political parties have signed up to participate in the June 12 general elections: Template:Multicol

• Alternative Party (Alternatif Parti, AP)
• Communist Party of Turkey (Türkiye Komünist Partisi, TKP)
• Democratic Party (Demokrat Parti, DP)
• Democratic Left Party (Demokratik Sol Parti, DSP)
• Equality and Democracy Party (Eşitlik ve Demokrasi Partisi, EDP)
• Felicity Party (Saadet Partisi, SP)
• Freedom and Solidarity Party (Özgürlük ve Dayanışma Partisi, ÖDP)
• Great Union Party (Büyük Birlik Partisi, BBP)
• Homeland Party (Yurt Parti, YURT-P)
• Independent Turkey Party (Bağımsız Türkiye Partisi, BTP)
• Justice and Development Party (Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi, AK Party)
• Labour Party (Emek Partisi, EMEP)
• Liberal Democratic Party (Liberal Demokrat Parti, LDP)
• Nation Party (Millet Partisi, MP)

• Nationalist and Conservative Party (Milliyetçi ve Muhafazakar Parti, MMP)
• Nationalist Movement Party (Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi, MHP)
• New Party (Yeni Parti, YP)
• Peace and Democracy Party (Barış ve Demokrasi Partisi, BDP)
• People's Ascent Party (Halkın Yükselişi Partisi, HYP)
• People’s Voice Party (Halkın Sesi Partisi, HSP)
• Republican People's Party (Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi, CHP)
• Rights and Equality Party (Hak ve Eşitlik Partisi, HEPAR)
• Rights and Freedoms Party (Hak ve Özgürlükler Partisi, HAKPAR)
• True Path Party (Doğru Yol Partisi, DYP)
• Turkey Party (Türkiye Partisi, TP)
• Workers' Party (İşçi Partisi, İP)
• Young Party (Genç Parti, GP)

Nine smaller political parties have decided to change their election strategy. Some of them decided to participate in the elections as independent, while others formed an alliance under one party. On April 19, 2011, the Supreme Election Board announced that ÖDP and YP could not join the June 12th general elections as they could not hand out their necessary documents on time. Thus, the number of political parties that will join the elections has dropped to 15.

Justice and Development Party

The large number of applications has given the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) nearly 15 million Turkish Liras in revenue ahead of the June 12 general elections. AK Party, which currently has the most female deputies in Parliament, plans to expand that number for the new term. Its aim is that all provinces with four to five deputies will have at least one female deputy candidate during the election. The total 5,599 applications to the AK Party include those of 855 female candidates and 315 candidates with disabilities. Each male applicant paid a fee of 3,000 liras, while women paid half that sum and people with disabilities had their fees waived. The applications thus brought in a total of 14.85 million liras to the party. This revenue, however, will not remain in the AK Party’s bank account after the elections, party leader Erdoğan said, explaining that candidates who do not make it onto the party’s list will have their money returned.

Key figures who applied to be AK Party candidates include Ambassador Volkan Bozkır, the head of Turkey’s General Secretariat for the European Union and former Istanbul Governor Muammer Güler.

April 12, 2011, was the last date for political parties to submit their list of candidate MPs to the Higher Election Board for the general elections. Prime Minister Erdogan dismissed half his party’s parliamentary deputies in for this election, aiming to rejuvenate the party as he seeks a third term in power. Erdogan nominated only 146 deputies out of the 333 parliamentary seats for the ruling Justice & Development party to stand again in this election. Of the AK Party’s 550 candidates, 514 have university degrees. There are also 11 people with disabilities on the list. Important figures from the party kept their positions with many ministers moved to the coastal regions where the party attracts less votes.

Republican People's Party

The 2011 general election is the first general election in which Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu participates as the leader of Republican People's Party (CHP). The former CHP leader Deniz Baykal resigned from his post in May 2010 and left the CHP with 26% of the votes, according to opinion polls. Kılıçdaroğlu announced that he would resign from his post if he was not successful in the 2011 elections. He did not provide details as to what his criteria for success are. Over 3,500 people have applied to run for the main opposition party in June’s elections. Male candidates paid 3,000 Turkish Liras to submit an application; female candidates paid 2,000 while those with disabilities paid 500 liras. Among the candidates are former CHP leader Deniz Baykal and arrested Ergenekon suspects such as Mustafa Balbay and Mehmet Haberal.

The party held primary elections in 29 provinces. Making a clean break with the past, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu has left his mark on the Republican People’s Party’s 435-candidate list, leaving off 78 current deputies as he seeks to redefine and reposition the main opposition. The CHP’s candidate list also includes 11 politicians who were formerly part of center-right parties such as the Motherland Party, the True Path Party and the Turkey Party. Center-right voters gravitated toward the AK Party when these other parties virtually collapsed after the 2002 elections. Key party figures that did not make it on to the list, criticised the CHP for making “a shift in axis.”

Kurdish issues

Following a rally by Erdogan in Kastamonu on 4 May, assailants ambushed a police convoy killing one person and wounding another. The Kurdistan Workers Party claimed responsibility for the attack after Erdogan accused "separatists" at another rally for the attack. The imprisoned party's leader Abdullah Ocalan warned Turkey of a "great war" if it failed to enter into "meaningful negotiations" after the election.