Posted on 06/07/2018 7:25:16 AM PDT by Texas Fossil
After sixteen years in power, Turkey’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) is facing a serious challenge from an allied opposition in the run-up to June 24 national election. Turkish voters will head to the polls that Sunday to vote on candidates for parliament and the presidency. The election is the first up-or-down vote for the AKP’s leader and current Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, following a national referendum last April. In the referendum, voters narrowly passed a series of changes to the constitution to transform the Turkish political system from a parliamentary model to a highly centralized presidential system of governance.
In the run-up to the election, Erdogan and his political ally, the far-right nationalist Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) surprised voters, after they agreed to move the date of the election up from November 2019 to June 2018. In addition, the two parties worked together to change Turkish electoral law to allow parties to run as a coalition, albeit while still allowing each parties’ logo to remain on the ballot. The coalition vote will be determined from the total number of votes cast for each party. The impetus for this change stems from a moment of political weakness when the AKP lost its parliamentary majority in June 2015, and from a prolonged failure to lower the ten percent threshold for parties to enter parliament. The AKP managed to regain its majority in November, but during those interim months the AKP adopted a more right wing nationalist platform, intended to expand its appeal with far right voters associated with the MHP.
The electoral changes, signal AKP discomfort and political weakness. AKP managed to win a very narrow majority for changes to the Turkish constitution, to create a viable pathway for Erdogan to take greater control over all elements of the state..
(Excerpt) Read more at atlanticcouncil.org ...
To date, the campaign has neither been free, nor fair. (Nor will they be)
We wait. The 24th is not that far away.
just settle back and watch the feathers fly.
Now that is a thought. smile.
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