The parliamentary candidate lists of 26 political parties for the May 14 general election have revealed that the gender gap in the Turkish parliament will remain.
The list of the Green Left Party (YSP) includes the most female parliamentary candidates with 40 percent of the total, according to the Mezopotamya news agency.
A total of 37.6 percent of the nationalist İYİ (Good) Party’s parliamentary candidates are women, while that figure is 26.3 percent for the Republican People’s Party (CHP).
The pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party HDP decided to run under the banner of the YSP in the parliamentary elections in a bid to circumvent the risks that could emerge from its possible closure ahead of the elections.
The HDP is facing a closure case on terrorism charges that was filed in March 2021 and could be concluded before the elections since the Constitutional Court, which is hearing the case, has rejected the HDP’s request to delay the verdict until after the elections.
According to Mezopotamya, 19 percent of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and 12 percent of the far-right Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) candidates are women.
Female representation in parliament was 9.1 percent in 2007, 14.3 percent in 2011, 14.7 percent in 2015 and 17.1 percent in 2018.
According to Turkish media reports, each party in President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s People’s Alliance – the ruling AKP, MHP, the Great Unity Party (BBP) and the New Welfare Party (YRP) – submitted their own lists, while the rival Nation Alliance, an opposition bloc of six parties, will compete in the election under the main opposition CHP and the nationalist İYİ Party lists.
