The ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) has completed its work on changes in the election and political parties law.
The commission led by AK Party Deputy Chairperson Hayati Yazıcı has prepared the draft, together with the views of the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), which includes revisions such as dropping the election threshold to 5% from 7% and reorganizing the conditions for treasury grants.
The current 10% threshold and the highest averages method, known as the D'Hondt method, were introduced with the 1982 Constitution, which was adopted in a referendum after the 1980 military coup.
The aim of the threshold was to prevent political instability as the former system of proportional representation introduced with the 1961 Constitution led to fragile coalition governments in the 1970s, with small or fringe parties gaining Cabinet powers far beyond their votes due to grisly coalition bargaining.
The proposal to hinder political parties’ competency of entering elections by establishing a group with deputy transfers after elections was also added, the BBC reported.
According to this, political parties will still be able to form groups if they get at least 20 deputies in elections. However, after elections, parties will not be able to form a group with deputies leaving a party and transferring to another even if the number reaches 20 seats.
Furthermore, it is envisaged that parties that are not in the Parliament must also hold regular congresses or councils.
In the current political parties law, a party has to have established an organization, made congresses or formed a group in the Parliament at least six months before the day of voting in at least half of Turkey’s provinces.
It was decided that the text will be transformed into a proposal with the joint efforts of the MHP.
