{"id":122801,"date":"2015-06-08T05:58:50","date_gmt":"2015-06-08T05:58:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/4cd.e16.myftpupload.com\/?p=122801"},"modified":"2015-06-08T05:58:50","modified_gmt":"2015-06-08T05:58:50","slug":"turkeys-akp-faces-challenge-to-form-government","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=122801","title":{"rendered":"Turkey’s AKP faces challenge to form government"},"content":{"rendered":"

Turkey’s AK party faces a challenge to form a government after losing its majority at a general election for the first time in 13 years.<\/p>\n

It secured 41%, a sharp drop from 2011, when it won nearly half of the vote.<\/p>\n

Under Turkey’s proportional representation system, this means the AKP will need to form a coalition or face entering a minority government.<\/p>\n

The pro-Kurdish HDP crossed the 10% threshold, securing seats in parliament for the first time.<\/p>\n

There were jubilant scenes as the party’s supporters took to the streets chanting “we are the HDP, we are going to the parliament”.<\/p>\n

“It is a carnival night,” 47-year-old Huseyin Durmaz told AFP. “We no longer trust the AKP.”<\/p>\n

HDP leader Selahattin Demirtas ruled out entering into a coalition with the AKP, pointing out that the election results had put an end to discussions about a presidential system.<\/p>\n

The result is a blow to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s plans to boost his office’s powers.<\/p>\n

He first came to power as prime minister in 2003 and had been seeking a two-thirds majority to turn Turkey into a presidential republic.<\/p>\n

“The discussion of executive presidency and dictatorship have come to an end in Turkey with these elections,” Mr Demirtas told a news conference in Istanbul.<\/p>\n

\"Supporters
HDP supporters took to the streets to herald the party’s surprise success<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Turkey's
Mr Davutoglu and his wife greeted supporters following the election results<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Speaking from the balcony of the AKP headquarters in Ankara Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said: “The winner of the election is again the AKP, there’s no doubt.”<\/p>\n

But he added: “Our people’s decision is final. It’s above everything and we will act in line with it.”<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n
\"Turkish
President Erdogan’s heavy involvement in the general election campaign proved controversial<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

With nearly all the votes counted, the AKP looks likely to win 258 seats in parliament, 18 fewer than it requires for a majority.<\/p>\n

The Republican People’s Party (CHP) looks set to be the second largest party, as in the previous parliament, polling around 25% of the vote.<\/p>\n

In third place is the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) on 16.5% and People’s Democratic Party (HDP) in fourth place with 13%.<\/p>\n

The HDP is expected to finish with 75 to 80 seats after successfully attracting votes beyond its Kurdish support base.<\/p>\n

The MHP’s leader Devlet Bahceli did not rule out the possibility of entering a coalition government, but said the results represented the “beginning of the end for the AKP”.<\/p>\n

Once viewed as invincible President Erdogan’s party has been criticised in recent years for its clampdown on free speech and its growing authoritarianism.<\/p>\n

–<\/p>\n

Source: BBC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Turkey’s AK party faces a challenge to form a government after losing its majority at a general election for the first time in 13 years. It secured 41%, a sharp drop from 2011, when it won nearly half of the vote. Under Turkey’s proportional representation system, this means the AKP will need to form a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":122804,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[14],"class_list":["post-122801","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-papa-owusu-ankomah"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122801","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=122801"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122801\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/122804"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=122801"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=122801"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=122801"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}