General Elections: Turkey enters the era of political instability

TURKEY - In Brief 08 Jun 2015 by Atilla Yesilada

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General Elections: Turkey enters the era of political instability General elections shed light on several questions that vexed experts’ minds, but immediately kindled new ones which are proving to be intractable. My current guess is that it will be very difficult to form a coalition of any kind, while the newly elected deputies would rebel at the idea of early elections before they gain they vestment (their entitlements as parliamentarians). A protracted period of drift and instability may have begun in Turkish politics which could push financial markets into bear market and the economy into recession. To my deep disappointment the High Election Council just announced that the final certification of deputies will not be made in less than 12 days, which means formal coalition talks can’t begin before the first session of the parliament on or after 21th of June. In the interim, the most recent but not final seat distribution is as follows: AKP: 258 CHP: 132 MHP: 80 HDP: 80 Regarding election results, it appears that AKP was wiped out in the Kurdish areas, while bleeding to MHP in the rest of the nation. CHP lent at least 2 perhaps 3 percentage points to HDP, which may explain why the party fans are not at all bothered by the lower-than-expected performance. It is also clear that the voters flocked to the three opposition parties united by the hatred of Erdogan and the undecideds of AKP stayed home to protest corruption and poor economic mismanagement. A more detailed analysis of election results will be made available as data becomes available but the idea of a highly personal presidential system is dead. AKP insiders also threaten that the Kurdish Peace Process is also ...