The President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has appointed Justice and Development Party (AKP) Leader Ahmet Davutoğlu as Prime Minister to preside over an interim Council of Ministers. The present of Council of Ministers will serve until the interim council is formed.
A written statement released by the presidential office said, “President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan who has decided the Grand National Assembly of Turkey elections will be held again has appointed Ahmet Davutoğlu as Prime Minister - deputy for Konya and Chairman of the AKP which has the largest number of seats - to form an interim Council of Ministers based on the 114th article of the constitution.”
Davutoğlu needs to form the interim council within five days following the assignment.
Erdoğan announced his decision to call for snap elections after a four-hour-long meeting with Parliament Speaker İsmet Yılmaz, which it was later published in Official Journal.
Following Erdoğan’s call for the June 7 elections to be held again, the president and Davutoğlu met in the Presidential Palace at 11:30 a.m. joined by the Supreme Election Board (YSK) to set the date of election.
Following the meeting, the YSK announced its decision – reached by an unanimous vote on the same day - that new elections will be held on November 1.
Erdoğan had expressed his preference for this date on August 24, saying, “Hopefully Turkey will hold a new election on November 1.”
In case the interim Council of Ministers is formed, based on the number of chairs each party has in parliament, AKP will have 11, CHP will have 5, HDP and MHP each will have 3 ministerial positions to assign their members.
While both CHP and MHP have declared that they won’t assign any members for the positions in the interim Council of Ministers, HDP said their members will participate in the council.
In the June 7 elections the AKP lost its 13-year-long majority in parliament, which created the need for a coalition government. The 45 day-long negotiation process among the parties to form a coalition government led to a political deadlock and ended in failure. (EA/TK)
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