Thanks to Sule Ozsoy, at an earlier thread, for clarifying where things stand in the process of electing a president in Turkey. If I understand correctly, the newly elected parliament must still attempt to elect a president, because the term of the current president has expired and thus it is not constitutionally permissible to wait for possible voter approval in October of the referendum on direct presidential elections.
With the AKP majority now reduced, it could again be impossible for parliament to elect a president. However, failure to do so could again trigger an early election for parliament, so I would expect the opposition to back down, given the huge surge in votes obtained by the AKP last Sunday.
If parliament does elect a president, then the first direct presidential election would not be held until 2014 (assuming the president elected by this new parliament serves a full term and that voters approve the referendum), because the constitution currently provides for a seven-year term (and five years for parliament). That president would be elected by a two-round majority system for a five-year term (and future parliamentary terms would be four years under the proposed amendments).
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The interpretations above are mine, not Sule’s (follow the first link to see the full comment, which contains other information as well).
I am also linking this to a post at PoliBlog, where Steven cited me with information that is apparently incorrect.
Gul May be Candidate for President of Turkey
Via the BBC: Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul says he has not ruled out reviving his presidential bid, days after his AK Party’s landslide election win.
Scion grafted by PoliBlog — 26 July 2007 @ 10:34
124 days after the process began, Abdullah Gül finally has been elected president of Turkey. Out of 550 members , 448 were present for the third round of voting in parliament and 339 voted for Gül. The runner-up candidate, from the Motherland Party, received only 70 votes and the Democratic Left’s candidate received 13.
Gul’s AKP had won a majority–341 seats–in the recent election (despite a drop in votes relative to 2002) and the second-place party, the Republicans, did so poorly in the elections that it did not bother to present a candidate for president this time, but it continued to boycott all three rounds of voting.
The AKP had secured commitments from other parties not to deny parliament a quorum this time (which could have triggered yet another parliamentary election that the AKP would have won). So, this was essentially a foregone conclusion. (The first two rounds require a two-thirds vote of parliament, but the final round requires only a majority of all members in the presence of a quorum. )
The story in Today’s Zaman (first link in this comment) notes that the previous record for lengthy presidential-election process in Turkey was 24 days for the election of Fahri Korutürk, the sixth president of Turkey. That was 15 rounds, however, whereas Gül was elected in six. The difference was the provision in the current constitution that requires a parliamentary election if the first three rounds are not conclusive. That provision effectively refers the election to the general electorate, albeit still indirectly. Assuming–as is likely–that the constitutional amendment for direct election is passed in the upcoming referendum, today will mark Turkey’s last indirect presidential election.
Seed planted by MSS — 28 August 2007 @ 14:45