PM Davutoğlu: The people ended the period of coalitions with the AK Party
by Anadolu Agency
ANKARAMay 20, 2015 - 12:00 am GMT+3
by Anadolu Agency
May 20, 2015 12:00 am
Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu has said the period of coalitions in Turkish politics ended 12 years ago when his ruling Justice and Development (AK Party) came to power alone.
His remarks on Tuesday came as political parties accelerated their election efforts and rallies with less than a month to go until the June 7parliamentary elections.
Davutoğlu stressed that he did not deem it likely for a coalition government in Turkey after the elections.
"Turkey has never seen success under the rule of coalitions in any way," he told a late night live interview on a joint broadcast of private ATV and A Haber networks.
He maintained that the success stories in Turkish politics were all experienced during single-party rule marked with stability.
He was referring to four single-party periods: the first was the 10-year Democrat Party rule under Prime Minister Adnan Menderes until the 1960 military coup that ended with his execution, and the second was the Justice Party government led by Süleyman Demirel between 1965 and 1969.
The third was Turgut Özal's Motherland Party government between 1983 and 1991, and the last one is the current AK Party government since 2002, Davutoğlu said.
He claimed that the era of coalitions ended in 2002 while opposition parties have failed to come up with strong alternatives to his ruling party.
"But the Turkish people will definitely make us pay if we fail or make a mistake," he said.
Speaking with no specific vote rate goal for the June elections, he emphasized that their criterion for elections success is to remain the ruling party by increasing their votes.
"The secret behind our success until now has been the fact that we speak the same language as the people," he said.
The AK Party was victorious in last year's March local elections and then Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan won the presidential election in August 2014.
In the 2011 general election, the AK Party received 49 percent of the vote.
The party has overseen an economic boost that almost tripled national income over the course of a decade, a power that was focused mainly on building Turkey's infrastructure at home and influence abroad.
Approximately 56 million Turkish citizens are eligible to vote next month in the country's 25th general election to choose 550 lawmakers for Parliament. Candidates are representing 20 political parties.
Turkey held general elections every five years until a 2007 constitutional change that set the elections every four years.
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