Pro-Erdogan Candidate Voted Turkey's New Parliament Speaker
The defense minister from Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's ruling party, which lost its majority in recent elections, was elected parliament speaker Wednesday, in a vote seen as a key barometer of the country's politics.
Ismet Yilmaz was elected speaker in the fourth and final round of voting with support from 258 deputies -- all from his Justice and Development Party (AKP) -- in the 550-seat parliament.
The election of the speaker has been seen as a weathervane of how the formation of Turkey's first coalition government since the AKP came to power in 2002 might pan out.
Yilmaz, a relatively low-profile candidate, was running against Deniz Baykal, the veteran former leader of the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP), who won 182 votes in the final round of voting.
Candidates from the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) and the pro-Kurdish People's Democratic Party's (HDP) were eliminated in the third round of voting.
The AKP has 258 seats in the parliament, the CHP 132, and the MHP and HDP have 80 apiece.
Some commentators said the results of the speaker vote signaled the possibility of a coalition between the AKP and the MHP, as the latter refused to vote for opposition candidate Baykal.
The AKP and the nationalist MHP share a core voter base of conservatives in the center of the country.
Erdogan is now expected to mandate Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu to form a government. If efforts to form a coalition are unsuccessful, Erdogan can call snap elections within 45 days.
Source: Agence France Presse
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