Turkish Cypriot ‘deputy prime minister’ Fikri Ataoglu on Tuesday called for snap ‘parliamentary’ elections to be held after the north’s budget is passed through its legislature at the end of this year.

Speaking to the north’s public broadcaster BRT, he firstly stressed that his party, the DP, one of the ruling coalition’s two minor parties, is ready for an election.

“The DP is always prepared for any situation, as if an election were to go ahead tomorrow, but the priority should be resolving the country’s problems, especially keeping the economic wheels turning,” he said.

Asked whether there will be an early election, he said there should be one “after the budget is passed”, with the north’s ‘state’ budget typically being passed through ‘parliament’ towards the end of December.

Last year, it was passed on December 20.

He then stressed that his party’s immediate priority is the forthcoming Turkish Cypriot leadership election, which will be held next month, with his party having endorsed incumbent Ersin Tatar for re-election.

“There is a presidential election ahead of us and we are on the ground for the candidate we support. Our work regarding the candidate we have decided to support has focused us on October 19. After that, there needs to be an early parliamentary election,” he said.

He then pointed out that the north is due to have local elections in December next year, with the latest possible date for the north’s next ‘parliamentary’ election set as February 2027.

As such, he said, “the parliamentary elections should be brought forward to avoid two consecutive election campaigns”.

“A snap parliamentary election should be held on a date to be determined after the presidential election, on a date which would not disturb anyone too much, would not affect the economy too much, and should be determined after the budget is passed,” he concluded.

Ataoglu is not the first high-profile figure from the ruling coalition to have called for an early legislative election, with ‘transport minister’ Erhan Arikli, the leader of fellow minor partner the YDP, having made multiple calls for early elections to be held.

Arikli also announced in July that he will not stand for election at the next legislative election, instead choosing to retire.

Were those two parties to insist, the major coalition partner, the UBP, would likely be left with no choice but to hold elections, given that they rely on the DP and the YDP for their ‘parliamentary’ majority.

The most recent legislative elections in the north were held in January 2022, and saw the UBP win 24 seats, the DP win three seats, and the YDP win two seats of a 50-seat chamber.

The opposition was made up of 18 ‘MPs’ from the CTP, the party of Tufan Erhurman, and three from the HP, the party of former Turkish Cypriot chief negotiator Kudret Ozersay.

Since then, Ozersay resigned from the legislature in 2023, with a subsequent by-election seeing that CTP pick up a 19th seat, and the two remaining HP ‘MPs’ left the party and now sit as independents.

Meanwhile, the DP’s Hasan Tosunoglu left the party and attempted to resign from the legislature, but was unsuccessful in the latter, and remains as an independent.

The UBP and the DP have been in coalition together since December 2020, with the YDP having also been a part of that coalition for its entirety, with the exception of a three-and-a-half-month spell between November 2021 and February 2022.