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Turkey's 12th general election was held on October 20, 1991. It was the first by the ruling Motherland Party to be contested without its founding leader, Turgut Özal, who had become Turkish president two years previously. The result was a swing against Özal's former party in favour of its fierce centre-right rival, the True Path Party led by Süleyman Demirel.

The vote saw two additional parties cross the 10 percent barrier to enter parliament. Necmettin Erbakan and his Welfare Party saw a party of religious background returned for the first time in 14 years. Welfare had a greatly increased share of the vote and took several key provinces, including Istanbul. Bülent Ecevit's Democratic Left Party also scraped through to win seven seats.

[edit] Results

[edit] Total votes and seats for each party

Parties		Votes			Seats
Parties		No.	%	+− %	No.	+−
	True Path Party (Doğru Yol Partisi)	6,600,726	27.03	+7.63	178	+119
	Motherland Party (Anavatan Partisi)	5,862,623	24.01	-12.30	115	-177
	Social Democratic Populist Party (Sosyaldemokrat Halkçı Partisi)	5,066,571	20.75	-3.89	88	-11
	Welfare Party (Refah Partisi)	4,121,355	16.88	+9.72	62	+62
	Democratic Left Party (Demokratik Sol Parti)	2,624,301	10.75	+2.22	7	+7
	Socialist Party (Sosyalist Parti)	108.369	0.44		0
	Independents	32,721	0.13	-0.24	0
No. of valid votes		24,416,666	100,00		450	0
Invalid votes		740,423
Total votes		25,157,089
Electorate size
Voter turnout
Sources: BBC Turkish Service and Turkish Parliament archives