Turkey’s 25th parliamentary election Sunday may have produced no majority government, but the parliament is already in the books with the highest number of women deputies in Turkish history, The Anadolu Agency reports.
With over 99.9 of the votes counted, the unofficial results show a total of 96 women parliamentarians securing seats in the Turkish Grand National Assembly.
The figure marks a notable rise against the background of the 2011 parliamentary election, when the Grand Assembly saw 79 women delegates.
Winning the 40.8 percent of the votes but failing to form a government of their own, the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) sent 41 women into the parliament members, five less than the 2011 election, becoming the only party with seats to lose women deputies.
The pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), which passed the 10 percent threshold with 13.11 percent of the vote to take 79 seats, has the support of 31 women MPs in its first time in the parliament as a party.
The HDP, which had a number of women members who won as independents in the 2011 election, has more than doubled its women deputy tally from 11 to 31.
One of the highlights among the HDP’s women MPs is Dilek Ocalan, nephew of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Ocalan.
Ocalan became a member of parliament from Sanliurfa, where HDP secured 5 out of 12 seats.
The Republican People’s Party (CHP), which won 24.96 percent of the votes to finish second nationwide, increased the number of their women delegates by only one to make it 20.
The Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) too added one more woman deputy to their list, bringing the total to four after winning 16.30 percent in the polls.
http://www.aa.com.tr/en/news/533241–turkey-election-more-women-mps-than-ever
Photo – Selina Dogan Ozuzun (R), an Armenian candidate for the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), chats with a CHP supporter during an election rally for Turkey’s June 7 parliamentary election, in Istanbul, Turkey, June 2, 2015. REUTERS Photo
