Thousand Hope Candidates

Thousand Hope Candidates

*Bin Umut Adayları*
Thousand Hope Candidates Bin Umut Adayları
Founded	2007
Preceded by	Democratic People's Party (2002)
Succeeded by	Labour, Democracy and Freedom Bloc (2011)
Ideology	Socialism; Minority rights; Kurdish nationalism
Political position	Left wing
Colours	Purple
Slogan	Türkiye'ye bir sözümüz var; (We have a promise for Turkey)
Participating parties	Democratic Society Party; Freedom and Solidarity Party; Labour Party; Socialist Democracy Party
Website
	Website [dead link‍]
	Politics of Turkey; Political parties; Elections;

The Thousand Hope Candidates (Turkish: Bin Umut Adayları) was an electoral alliance between four left-wing political parties in Turkey, formed in preparation for the 2007 general election. The alliance contested the election by fielding candidates from participating parties as independents in order to bypass the 10% election threshold needed to win seats in the Turkish Grand National Assembly. The alliance's candidates won a total of 1,334,518 votes and 22 seats in the election.^[1]

Lacking a realistic prospect of gaining parliamentary representation due to the 10% threshold, the pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party (DTP), the socialist libertarian Freedom and Solidarity Party (ÖDP), the Labour Party (EMEP) and the Socialist Democracy Party (SDP) joined forces and decided to field candidates under a joint alliance, hence creating the Thousand Hope alliance.^[2] The alliance stated that its candidates included individuals who could extend the appeal of the political left to the general public, having also extended support to other left-wing candidates who were not part of the four member parties.^[3] The alliance fielded 65 candidates in 40 provinces.^[4] The Labour Party and the Freedom and Solidarity Party fielded their own candidates in the remaining 41 provinces but fell well short of the 10% electoral threshold.

The alliance was also in favour of minority rights, having openly campaigned as 'Kurds wanting peace'. Segments of society such as the LGBT community, which the alliance claimed had faced discrimination and oppression, played a major role in alliance's election campaign. Critics branded the alliance as Kurdish nationalist, pointing to the pro-Kurdish DTP, which was the biggest of the four participating parties.^[5]

A similar alliance, namely the Labour, Democracy and Freedom Bloc, was formed in preparation for the 2011 general election four years later.

General election performance

Results

Thousand Hope Candidates' performance in the 2007 general election
Participating parties				Votes			Seats		Map
Party		Leader	Candidates	Votes	Percentage	Swing	Elected	Seat ±	Map
	Democratic Society Party	Ahmet Türk	65	1,334,518	3.81%	2.42%	22 / 550	22
	Freedom and Solidarity Party	Ufuk Uras
	Socialist Democracy Party	Akın Birdal
	Labour Party	Levent Tüzel

This table only shows the votes won by the Thousand Hope candidates, who stood in 40 provinces. In the remaining 41 provinces, the Freedom and Solidarity Party and the Labour Party fielded their own candidates. The votes that they won in these other provinces that were not part of the Thousand Hope candidate alliance are not shown.
Swing and seat change is compared to the Democratic People's Party's performance in the 2002 general election
Provinces won by Thousand Hope candidates are coloured purple in the map

Elected members

22 of a total of 65 candidates were elected. The combined votes won by Thousand Hope candidates were higher than any other party in the provinces of Tunceli, Diyarbakır, Muş, Iğdır, Hakkari and Şırnak. The results represented a significant swing to the governing Justice and Development Party (AKP), which made heavy gains in the Kurdish south-east were the Democratic People's Party had won back in 2002. Only 2 of the 22 Thousand Hope Candidates elected were from non-southeastern provinces, namely Ufuk Uras and Sebahat Tuncel from İstanbul's 1st and 3rd electoral district respectively. The following table shows the distribution of DTP, SDP, EMEP and ÖDP members within the 22 elected members.

	Leader	Elected
Democratic Society Party	Ahmet Türk	20 / 22
Socialist Democracy Party	Akın Birdal	1 / 22
Freedom and Solidarity Party	Ufuk Uras	1 / 22
Labour Party	Levent Tüzel	0 / 22
Thousand Hope total		22 / 550

The full list of members elected under the Thousand Hope banner are as follows:

	Party	Electoral district	Vote share
Ahmet Türk	Democratic Society Party	Mardin	19.35%
Akın Birdal	Socialist Democracy Party	Diyarbakır	11.78%
Ayla Akat Ata	Democratic Society Party	Batman	19.78%
Aysel Tuğluk	Democratic Society Party	Diyarbakır	9.44%
Bengi Yıldız	Democratic Society Party	Batman	19.30%
Emine Ayna	Democratic Society Party	Mardin	15.57%
Fatma Kurtulan	Democratic Society Party	Van	11.80%
Gültan Kışanak	Democratic Society Party	Diyarbakır	12.59%
Hamit Geylani	Democratic Society Party	Hakkari	17.58%
Hasip Kaplan	Democratic Society Party	Şırnak	24.18%
İbrahim Binici	Democratic Society Party	Şanlıurfa	6.11%
Mehmet Nezir Karabaş	Democratic Society Party	Bitlis	16.04%
Mehmet Nuri Yaman	Democratic Society Party	Muş	16.83%
Ufuk Uras	Freedom and Solidarity Party	İstanbul (I)	3.74%
Osman Özçelik	Democratic Society Party	Siirt	24.59%
Özdal Üçer	Democratic Society Party	Van	11.20%
Pervin Buldan	Democratic Society Party	Iğdır	26.90%
Sebahat Tuncel	Democratic Society Party	İstanbul (III)	4.54%
Selahattin Demirtaş	Democratic Society Party	Diyarbakır	9.74%
Sevahir Bayındır	Democratic Society Party	Şırnak	29.47%
Sırrı Sakık	Democratic Society Party	Muş	16.90%
Şerafettin Halis	Democratic Society Party	Tunceli	27.14%

Votes won by participating parties elsewhere

The Labour Party and the Freedom and Solidarity Party both fielded candidates as a party in electoral districts where the Thousand Hope Candidates did not run for election. The votes shares won by these parties are as follows.

Party		Votes			Seats
Party		Votes	Percentage	Swing	Elected	Seat ±
	Freedom and Solidarity Party	52,055	0.15%	0.19%	0	0
	Labour Party	26,292	0.08%	0.08%	0	0

References

^ "DTP, kalelerinde oy kaybına uğradı / Siyaset / Milliyet Gazete". Milliyet.com.tr. 2007-07-31. Retrieved 2015-08-29.
^ Marlies Casier; Joost Jongerden (2011). Nationalisms and Politics in Turkey: Political Islam, Kemalism and the Kurdish Issue. Routledge. pp. 134–135. ISBN 978-0-203-84706-0.
^ "Bin Umut Adayları". Archived from the original on June 18, 2015. Retrieved June 18, 2015.
^ "Seçime bağımsız girecek "Bin Umut Adayları" tanıtıldı –". Sendika.org. 2 June 2007. Retrieved 2015-08-29.
^ "DTPs Baptism of Fire - Güneş Murat Tezcür - english". Bianet.org. 2007-07-22. Retrieved 2015-08-29.

External links

ÖDP official website
SDP official website Archived 2011-08-10 at the Wayback Machine
EMEP official website
The DTP, having been dissolved in 2009 and replaced by the Peace and Democracy Party, no longer has an active website.

[1] "DTP, kalelerinde oy kaybına uğradı / Siyaset / Milliyet Gazete". Milliyet.com.tr. 2007-07-31. Retrieved 2015-08-29.

[CasierJongerden2010-2] Marlies Casier; Joost Jongerden (2011). Nationalisms and Politics in Turkey: Political Islam, Kemalism and the Kurdish Issue. Routledge. pp. 134–135. ISBN 978-0-203-84706-0.

[3] "Bin Umut Adayları". Archived from the original on June 18, 2015. Retrieved June 18, 2015.

[4] "Seçime bağımsız girecek "Bin Umut Adayları" tanıtıldı –". Sendika.org. 2 June 2007. Retrieved 2015-08-29.

[5] "DTPs Baptism of Fire - Güneş Murat Tezcür - english". Bianet.org. 2007-07-22. Retrieved 2015-08-29.

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v t e Electoral alliances in Turkey
Represented in the Parliament	People's Alliance (313) Labour and Freedom Alliance (65) Felicity and Future Alliance (20)
Other alliances	Kurdish Freedom and Democracy Alliance Peoples' Democratic Congress
Defunct alliances	Thousand Hope Candidates Labour, Democracy and Freedom Bloc United June Movement Ancestral Alliance Nation Alliance Union of Socialist Forces
Related topics	Coalition governments in Turkey
Category Portal:Politics Politics of Turkey