Candidate lists show İstanbul will be heart of election race

14 April 2011, Thursday
EMİNE DOLMACI, İSTANBUL

Deputy candidate lists recently submitted by political parties to the Supreme Election Board (YSK) have shown that İstanbul will be the heart of this year's parliamentary elections, with party leaders and their top officials running in the elections from İstanbul.

Apart from MHP leader Devlet Bahçeli, who will seek to be a deputy from his hometown of Osmaniye, the leaders of almost all political parties will run as deputy candidates from İstanbul. Prime Minister and AK Party leader Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, CHP leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, SP leader Mustafa Kamalak, HAS Party leader Numan Kurtulmuş, DP leader Namık Kemal Zeybek and DSP leader Masum Türker are all candidates from İstanbul.

Additionally, the fact that the YSK redistributed the number of seats in Parliament to provinces according to the 2007 results of the address-based population registration system and increased the number of seats for İstanbul from 70 to 85 also makes İstanbul of critical importance for the parties.

Political party leaders have also placed their top party officials on deputy candidate lists for İstanbul. While Erdoğan is the top nominee from İstanbul’s first electoral region, he put State Minister Egemen Bağış in second place; parliamentary Constitutional Commission head Burhan Kuzu in the list for the second electoral region; and Labor Minister Ömer Dinçer and former Interior Minister Abdülkadir Aksu on the list of the third electoral region.

CHP leader Kılıçdaroğlu preferred to run from the second electoral region. CHP Secretary-General Bihlun Tamaylıgil follows him on the CHP list for this region. CHP Deputy Chairman Gürsel Tekin was put at the top of the list for the first electoral region.

Although MHP leader Bahçeli will run in the elections from Osmaniye, one of the party’s heavyweights, Meral Akşener, is a candidate from İstanbul’s third electoral region. The MHP nominated retired Gen. Engin Alan, a suspect in the trial involving the Sledgehammer military plot, from İstanbul’s first electoral region, while former State Minister Murat Başesgioğlu was nominated from the second electoral region.

In addition to the recent increase of seats for İstanbul, the number of voters has also increased in İstanbul when compared to the latest parliamentary elections held in 2007. Voter statistics are yet to be confirmed by the YSK, but the number of voters has reportedly increased by 2 million, and 9 million will cast vote in the elections in İstanbul.

After the YSK redistributed the number of seats in Parliament to provinces, the YSK increased the number of deputies for 14 provinces that experienced a population increase and reduced the number of deputies for 28 provinces with a population decrease.

The YSK increased the number of seats from 70 to 85 for İstanbul, from 29 to 31 for Ankara and from 24 to 26 for İzmir. Among the provinces that lost more than two seats were Konya, Trabzon and Tokat. After the redistribution of the seats, the deputies from the three big provinces -- İstanbul, Ankara and İzmir -- will constitute almost one-fourth of Parliament. These three provinces together with 11 other provinces, which will have more deputies this year, will constitute almost half of Parliament.

The total number of deputies from these 14 provinces increased from 221 to 254.

Source: Today's Zaman.
Link: http://www.todayszaman.com/news-241001-candidate-lists-show-istanbul-will-be-heart-of-election-race.html.