2007 Turkish presidential election

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2007 Turkish presidential election

← 2000 20 August 2007 (first round) 24 August 2007 (second round) 28 August 2007 (third round) 2014 →
550 members of the Grand National Assembly 276 votes needed to win
Turnout	81.45% 15.46pp
Candidate Abdullah Gül Sabahattin Çakmakoğlu Hüseyin Tayfun İçli [tr] Party AK Party MHP DSP Electoral vote 339 70 13 Percentage 80.33% 16.59% 3.08%
President before election Ahmet Necdet Sezer Independent Elected President Abdullah Gül AK Party

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The 2007 Turkish presidential election refers to two attempts to elect the country's 11th president, to succeed Ahmet Necdet Sezer. The most likely candidate for president was Abdullah Gül. Turkey's presidential office is regarded as the guardian of the country's secular system; the fact that Gül's wife wears the Islamic headscarf, as well as his own history in political Islam, turned the elections into a political crisis.

The first attempt consisted of the first rounds on 27 April and its repeat on 6 May after Turkey's constitutional court annulled the first round on 27 April. The constitutional court decided that a quorum of two-thirds was necessary, which was impossible without opposition support. Both first rounds were almost entirely boycotted by opposition MPs to disable the voting to start. Therefore, the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) was unsuccessful in electing its candidate, foreign minister Abdullah Gül. AKP then called a snap election which was held on 22 July 2007. The general elections saw it returned to government with a larger proportion of the vote. Subsequently, Gül was renominated and was finally elected in the third round of the second attempt of presidential election.^[1] The first round of this voting was on 20 August, while a second was on 24 August and a third was on 28 August. There was a quorum this time, since some opposition parties, most importantly the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), did not boycott the election.