The TRNC Assembly rejected the ‘motion of no confidence’ tabled by the main opposition Republican Turkish Party (CTP) last week, by 27 votes.
Opposition party representatives, who addressed Tuesday’s session of parliament in which the motion was discussed, claimed that the UBP-DP coalition government had lost the public’s trust and confidence.
Members of the coalition government on the other hand argued that “the government needed to remain in office to complete its tasks and promises”.
Meanwhile, BRT also reported that the assembly unanimously approved that the parliamentary committee urgently examines a proposal made by the Republican Turkish Party to hold early elections on the 2nd of July 2017.
The parliamentary committee approved the proposal put forward by the DP leader and Deputy Prime Minister Serdar Denktas to hold elections in April 2018, with a majority vote.
Speaking during Tuesday’s session, the leader of the main opposition CTP Tufan Erhurman, challenged Prime Minister Huseyin Ozgurgun by stating that the head of the coalition, which has not been in power for more than a year, had been talking about heading into early elections. He said that the opposition had proposed early elections to call the prime minister’s bluff.
Ozgurgun for his part said that his party was not afraid of holding elections.
Responding to criticisms that the UBP-DP coalition was a minority government, Ozgurgun said that they had the support of 27 deputies in the 50 seat parliament. He defended his government’s actions, stating that they had taken over a weak budget when coming to office and added: “We have put on an impressive performance in dealing with the country’s problems from the day we took office”.
Also touching upon the Cyprus problem, Ozgurgun stated that the negotiations had come to a standstill due to the South Cyprus’ House of Representatives’ vote on commemorating the 1950 Enosis plebiscite. He argued that “parliament always supported the continuation of the negotiations but the assembly should review its position regarding the talks, following the Greek Cypriot House’s vote on Enosis Day”.
BRT