CEDH · PRESS;CHAMBERJUDGMENTS;ENG — 30 janvier 2007

.s800EAC49 { font-size:12pt } .sFE10DC93 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:center } .s29100277 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold } .s40F41F73 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:right } .s32563E28 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .sBB9EE52A { font-family:Arial } .s7ED160F0 { text-decoration:none } .s33165EBA { font-family:Arial; font-size:8pt; vertical-align:super; color:#0069d6 } .s4DDA3AA3 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold; font-style:italic } .s9FF10068 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:12pt } .s65B66A85 { margin-top:12pt; margin-bottom:12pt } .sD6E2332A { margin-top:12pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .s76CF415B { page-break-before:always; clear:both } .sCB9E0544 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:left } .sADADF4A7 { font-family:Arial; text-decoration:underline } .s9793A85B { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-indent:14.2pt } .sC7EAD8B { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold; text-decoration:underline } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .sF6A12959 { width:33%; height:1px; text-align:left } .s2EB42ED2 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; font-size:10pt } .s653E6C45 { font-family:Arial; font-size:6.67pt; vertical-align:super; color:#0069d6 } EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS   70 30.01.2007   Press release issued by the Registrar   CHAMBER JUDGMENT YUMAK AND SADAK v. TURKEY   The European Court of Human Rights has today notified in writing its Chamber judgment [1] in the case of Yumak and Sadak v. Turkey (application no. 10226/03).   The Court held by 5 votes to 2 that there had been no violation of Article 3 of Protocol No.   1 to the European Convention on Human Rights (right to free elections).   (The judgment is available only in French.)   1.     Principal facts   Mehmet Yumak and Resul Sadak are Turkish nationals who were born in 1962 and 1959 respectively and live in Şırnak (Turkey). Mr Yumak is self-employed, while Mr Sadak is Mayor of Idil. The application concerns Turkish electoral law, according to which a party must obtain at least 10% of the national vote in parliamentary elections in order to win seats in the National Assembly. In the parliamentary elections of 3 November 2002 the applicants stood as candidates for the political party DEHAP (Democratic People’s Party) in the province of Şırnak. As a result of the ballot, DEHAP obtained approximately 45.95% of the vote (47,449 votes) in Şırnak province, but did not secure 10% of the vote nationally. The applicants were not elected, in accordance with section 33 of the Election of Members of Parliament Act (Law No. 2939), which states that “parties may not win seats unless they obtain, nationally, more than 10% of the votes validly cast”. Consequently, of the three parliamentary seats allotted to Şırnak province, two were filled by the AKP (Justice and Development Party), which obtained 14.05% of the vote (14,460 votes), and the third by an independent candidate, Mr Tatar, who obtained 9.69% of the vote (9,914 votes).   2.     Procedure and composition of the Court   The application was lodged on 1 March 2003 and declared partly admissible on 9 May 2006.   Judgment was given by a Chamber of seven judges, composed as follows:   Jean-Paul Costa (French), President , Ireneu Cabral Barreto (Portuguese), Riza Türmen (Turkish), Mindia Ugrekhelidze (Georgian), Antonella Mularoni (San Marinese), Elisabet Fura-Sandström (Swedish), Dragoljub Popović (Serbian), judges , and also Sally Dollé , Section Registrar .   3.     Summary of the judgment [2]   Complaints   Relying on Article 3 of Protocol No. 1 to the European Convention on Human Rights (right to free elections), the applicants submitted that setting a threshold of 10% of the vote in parliamentary elections interfered with the free expression of the opinion of the people in their choice of the legislature.   Decision of the Court   Article 3 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention   The Court noted that the 10% threshold for obtaining seats in the Turkish parliament was laid down in section 33 of law no. 2839. It had been introduced well before the elections of 3   November 2002, so that the applicants could have foreseen that if their party did not cross the threshold they could not win any parliamentary seats, irrespective of the number of votes they obtained in their electoral constituency.   The Court accepted that the purpose of the measure was to avoid excessive parliamentary fragmentation and reinforce government stability, regard being had in particular to the period of instability which Turkey had been through in the 1970s.   As regards the proportionality of the measure, the Court observed that the Turkish electoral system, which had a high threshold without any corrective counterbalances, had produced in Turkey, after the elections of 3 November 2002, the least representative parliament since the introduction of the multi-party system in 1946. In concrete terms, 45.3% of the electorate (about 14.5   million voters) was completely unrepresented in parliament.   However, analysis of the results of parliamentary elections held since the adoption of the threshold showed that it could not as such block the emergence of political alternatives within society. Similarly, the Court noted with interest the Government’s argument that the aim of the threshold was to give small parties the possibility of establishing themselves nationally and thus form part of a national political project.   In that connection, the Court acknowledged that the Turkish authorities, both judicial and legislative, but also politicians, were best placed to assess the choice of an appropriate electoral system, and that it could not propose an ideal solution which would correct the shortcomings of the Turkish electoral system. However, it noted that of all the systems used in the member States of the Council of Europe [3] the 10% threshold applied in Turkey appeared to be the highest.   Consequently, while noting that it was desirable for the threshold to be lowered and/or for corrective counterbalances to be introduced to ensure optimal representation of the various political tendencies without sacrificing the objective sought (the establishment of stable parliamentary majorities), the Court considered that it was important to leave the state concerned sufficient latitude. In that connection, it also attached importance to the fact that the electoral system was the subject of much debate within Turkish society and that numerous proposals of ways to correct the threshold’s effects were being made both in parliament and among leading figures of civil society. What was more, as early as 1995 the Constitutional Court had stressed that the constitutional principles of fair representation and governmental stability necessarily had to be combined in such a way as to balance and complement each other.   That being so, the Court considered that Turkey had not overstepped its wide margin of appreciation with regard to Article   3 of Protocol No. 1, notwithstanding the high level of the threshold complained of. It accordingly held that there had been no violation of Article 3 of Protocol No.   1.   Judges Cabral Barreto and Mularoni expressed a joint dissenting opinion, which is annexed to the judgment.   ***   The Court’s judgments are accessible on its Internet site ( http://www.echr.coe.int ).   Press contacts Emma Hellyer (telephone: 00 33 (0)3 90 21 42 15) Stéphanie Klein (telephone: 00 33 (0)3 88 41 21 54) Beverley Jacobs (telephone: 00 33 (0)3 90 21 54 21)   The European Court of Human Rights was set up in Strasbourg by the Council of Europe Member States in 1959 to deal with alleged violations of the 1950 European Convention on Human Rights.   [1] Under Article 43 of the European Convention on Human Rights, within three months from the date of a Chamber judgment, any party to the case may, in exceptional cases, request that the case be referred to the 17 ‑ member Grand Chamber of the Court. In that event, a panel of five judges considers whether the case raises a serious question affecting the interpretation or application of the Convention or its protocols, or a serious issue of general importance, in which case the Grand Chamber will deliver a final judgment. If no such question or issue arises, the panel will reject the request, at which point the judgment becomes final. Otherwise Chamber judgments become final on the expiry of the three-month period or earlier if the parties declare that they do not intend to make a request to refer. [2] This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court. [3] Examples of member States which use one or other variant of proportional representation within a mixed system featuring a threshold: in Sweden a party must obtain 4% of the votes cast nationally or 12% of the votes cast in the seat’s base constituency; In Bulgaria there is a national threshold of 4%; in Liechtenstein it is necessary to obtain 8% of the votes cast nationally; in Denmark candidates must obtain either 2% of the national vote or a fixed number of votes in two of the country’s three geographical zones; in the Netherlands there is a national threshold of 0.67% of the votes cast.