On 28 March, 2021 the first elections to the Upper Chamber of Parliament, the Khalk Maslakhaty, were held in Turkmenistan.
The state information agency TDH reports that the voting at polling stations started at 10 a.m. with 440 national observers monitoring the elections.
As of now, the voting ended and election commissions in the provinces and in Ashgabat are counting ballots. 48 candidates will get seats in the Khalk Maslakhaty.
It was previously reported that the Central Election and Referendum Commission registered 111 candidates. 16 out of them had been nominated by velayat and Ashgabat municipal Khalk Maslakhaty (People’s Councils), 95 by etrap and municipal Khalk Maslakhaty.
The list of all сandidates and their biographies, based on publications in the newspaper Neitralny Turkmenistan”, is available in a PDF format here.
The election campaign was held from 8 to 27 March, 2021. Correspondents of “Chronicles of Turkmenistan” had not noticed any political activity related to the elections.
Pursuant to the revised Constitution, adopted in September 2020, which records сhanges in the structure of two-chamber Parliament, the Upper Chamber will consist of 56 members.
Apart from candidates nominated by local Khalk Maslakhaty by secret ballot, eight more candidates will be appointed by the President.
In the 13th collection of “Chronicle of Great Accomplishment” published on 18 March and devoted to developments in Turkmenistan in 2019, the session of the Khalk Maslakhaty (the advisory body at that time) where it was proposed to set up a bicameral Parliament was announced the most significant event of the year.The post Turkmenistan holds elections to the Upper Chamber of Parliament first appeared on Chronicles of Turkmenistan.