Turkey Premier agrees to make way for Ciller next week

The agreement was reached at a meeting last night between four DYP leaders including Ekinci and Erbakan’s Islamic Fundamentalist Rifah (Welfare) Party.He said a new DYP-Rifah coalition headed by Ciller would take over to run the country up to early general elections.

The principle of the transfer had already been decided between the two sides but until now no date had been set. Rifah and the DYP still have to obtain the support of the extreme right Grand Union Party (BBP) of Muhsin Yazicioglu to have an absolute majority in Parliament. The latest resignation decreased the number of RP deputies in parliament to 158, while the Conservatives hold 117 seats reducing the coalition’s total to 275, exactly half parliament’s 550 seats. Only last weekend the coalition, much weakened by a series of resignations from the Conservative wing, managed to regain a parliamentary majority when an independent deputy who had earlier resigned from the Democratic left party joined the DYP.