The ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) and its ally Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) nominated Numan Kurtulmuş for the post of parliamentary speaker. Kurtulmuş, who formally applied for the job on Tuesday, will likely be elected as the AK Party and its allies make up the majority in the Turkish Grand National Assembly (TBMM).
The deputy chairperson of the AK Party will compete against three other candidates, including Tülay Hatimoğulları, nominated by Green Left Party (YSP), and Cihan Paçacı, nominated by Good Party (IP) and Can Atalay from the Turkish Labor Party (TİP). On the other hand, the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) has not nominated a candidate yet.
The parliamentary speaker will succeed Mustafa Şentop, an AK Party lawmaker elected in 2019. The parliamentary speaker is elected twice every legislative period for two-year and three-year tenures. Türkiye went to polls for the parliamentary and presidential vote on May 14. As the oldest member of Parliament, MHP leader Devlet Bahçeli temporarily replaced Şentop after the elections.
Parliament will convene on Wednesday for the election, which requires any candidate to win 400 votes or two-thirds of the parliamentary seats.
Kurtulmuş, a renowned academic, made his foray into politics in 1998 and joined the AK Party in 2012. He served as deputy prime minister and minister of culture and tourism in the past AK Party governments before he was appointed the party’s deputy chair in 2018.
Last Friday, 600 lawmakers elected or reelected to the Parliament were sworn in.
The AK Party won 268 seats, the most in Parliament, in May 14 elections, as it entered its third decade in power with the latest victory. In addition to the AK Party, its People’s Alliance partners MHP won 50 seats, and the New Welfare Party (YRP) won five, securing a combined majority of 323 seats out of the total 600 in Parliament.
With 169 deputies, the CHP, along with its coalition partner, the IP, secured a total of 212 seats in Parliament, representing the main opposition Nation’s Alliance. The smaller partners of the CHP-led six-party opposition coalition got almost 40 lawmakers by entering the parliamentary elections under CHP lists.
The Labor and Freedom Alliance won Parliament’s remaining 65 seats, comprised of the YSP with 61 seats and the TIP with four.
Of the 36 political parties that competed for parliamentary seats, a total of 15 will be making up Parliament in its new term in five separate groups, but most of their leaders are to be absent from the assembly after failing to be elected as lawmakers.