Less than two weeks from today(May 26), Turks will be voting for all 550 seats of the Grand National Assembly on Sunday, June 7. Apart from the four major parties(which will be described), there are several smaller parties hoping to cross the 10% threshold needed to win seats. Let's meet the four major parties with information coming from Wiki.
Justice and Development Party(AKP)
This Conservative party that currently holds the majority in Parliament, and it's also the party of Turkey's current President, Recep Erdogan. Their parliamentary leader is Prime Minister Ahmet Davatoglu. Part of their platform includes changing the constitution to create a stronger presidential republic. They also plan to raise pensions, continue work on the Kanal Istanbul project, and expand the nation's high-speed rail system. They also want to give Turkey a more active role in regional affairs while continuing to push for EU membership. However, they have been criticised by many for eroding turkey's secular Islamic principles, which coukld be furthered by several of the party's proposed constitutional amendments in the New Turkey Contract. The AKP currently has 312 seats.
Republican People's Party(CHP)
This is the party of Ataturk, and is currently being led by Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu. It's a social democratic party that wants raise disability benefits and increase the monthly minimum wage to 1,500 Turkish Lira(roughly US$570) from the current 900 Lira. They also wish to grant pensioners large payouts on Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha. They also want to abolish the "Taseron contract" which was implemented by the AKP and hires public workers on a temporary basis, and they plan to reduce inflation to 4% annually while reducing unemployment to 5%. They also plan to build a large city as a trade hub for the region by 2035. The CHP currently has 125 seats.
Nationalist Movement Party(MHP)
This far-right, Turkish nationalist party is led by Devlet Bahçeli. They wish to bring an end to the "solution process", which is the ongoing peace negotations between the Turkish Government and Kurdish separatist groups such as the PKK(Kurdistan' Workers Party). Unlike the AKP, they are a more secular party and wish to increase the monthly minimum wage to 1,400 lira. They also support amending the constitution, but they wish to keep references to "Turks" that the AKP wishes to remove. They also do not witsh for other ethnic minorities to be recognised by the constitution. In other matters, they wish to reduce compulsory schooling lengths to nine years from the current 12-year requirement, build a manufacturing-based economy, investiagte all individuals implicated in a 2013 corruption scandal, and instigate a strong international response to terrorist organisations such as IS. The NHP currently has 52 seats.
Peoples' Democratic Party(HDP)
This left-wing party is lead by Selahattin Demirtaş and Figen Yüksekdağ. It's the closest thing Turkey has to a Green Party, and was largely involved in the Gezi Park demonstrations of 2013. They're considered a social democratic party, and they're anti-nationalist. Their platform includes the creation of a Ministry of Women and making March 8-International Women's Day-a national holiday. They also plan to abolish the Presidency of Religious Affairs(the spiritual successor to the Ottoman Caliphs enshrined in the constitution) and the Council of Higher Education while making university tuition more affordable. They also favour opening the border with Armenia, instituting policies to end homophobia, and stopping investment in nuclear power while reducing the work week to 35 hours. In terms of constitutional change, they support a co-premiership system for parties with more than one leader(such as the HDP, which requires one man and one woman to lead them), and allow provincial governors to be elected rather than appointed as they are now. They also wish to raise the monthly minimum wage to 1,800 lira. The HDP currently has 29 seats.
32 other seats are either vacant or belong to independents and smaller parties.
So, NSG, who do you support?
Although I agree more with the HDP, I have to support the CHP this time around, if only to put a stop to Erdogan''s and Davatoglu's mad rush to destroying the secular state and muzzling the armed forces that have defended these principles.
