1931 Turkish general election

1931 Turkish general election

←  1927 25 April 1931 1935  →
All 317 seats in the Grand National Assembly 159 seats needed for a majority
Turnout	88%
First party Second party   Leader Mustafa Kemal Atatürk – Party CHP Independents Last election 335 0 seats Seats won 287 30 Seat change 48 30
Prime Minister before election İsmet İnönü CHP Elected Prime Minister İsmet İnönü CHP

General elections were held in Turkey in 1931. ^[1] The Republican People's Party was the only party in the country at the time, as the Liberal Republican Party that had been set up the previous year had already been dissolved. ^[1] Voter turnout was reported to be 88%. ^[2]

Background

Candidates were nominated by the Council of the Presidency of the CHP. Unlike in previous elections, candidates were sought from across the country, with a total of 1,176 nominations for the 287 candidates. ^[1]

Electoral system

The elections were held under the Ottoman electoral law passed in 1908, ^[1] which provided for a two-stage process. In the first stage, voters elected secondary electors (one for the first 750 voters in a constituency, then one for every additional 500 voters). In the second stage the secondary electors elected the members of the Turkish Grand National Assembly. ^[3]

Although the country was a one-party state at the time, thirty seats were set aside for independents. Independent candidates were required to be "republican, nationalist and sincere." ^[1]

References

1. Myron E. Weiner, Ergun Özbudun (1987) Competitive Elections in Developing Countries, Duke University Press, p337
2. Weiner & Özbudun, p340
3. Weiner & Özbudun, p334