The story so far via the BBC: Turkey votes again on president
while the ruling party’s candidate, Abdullah Gul, is again expected to win easily, it is thought he will only win outright in a third round next week.
[…]
In the first round of voting on Monday, he secured 341 votes - falling short of the two-thirds majority needed to win outright.
Friday’s vote is expected to follow a similar pattern, with the other two candidates - Sabahattin Cakmakoglu from the right-wing Nationalist Action Party, and Tayfun Icli from the centre-left Democratic Left Party - unlikely to challenge Mr Gul.
Sphere: Related ContentHowever, in a third round, a candidate needs only a simple majority to win - leading analysts to predict confidently that Mr Gul will be declared president next Tuesday, 28 August.
Important additional points here: Gul will win not only because a majority suffices on the third round, but also because other parties sufficient to amount to the required 2/3 quorum on that final vote have agreed they will not boycott the session.
It was their boycott that prevented the election of Gul a couple of months ago and resulted in early elections.
The Republican party, which did poorly in the elections, did not even put up a candidate in these first two rounds. They won’t vote for Gul, but they have shown by their decision not to put up a candidate that they are willing to passively let him become president. The early parliamentary elections were thus the decisive factor here.
(I add these points because they have been either left out or buried deep within the American and British media reports I have seen.)
Comment by MSS — Friday, August 24, 2024 @ 10:46 am