PodcastMHP seeks up to 5-year jail term for pollsters over providing 'misleading' information
A bill submitted by the ruling coalition partner and ultra-nationalist MHP seeks up to five years in jail for pollsters over survey results providing “false, misleading or incomplete information with the aim of directing or influencing the public.”
Duvar English
Turkish ruling coalition partner, far-right Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) has submitted a new bill to parliament, seeking imprisonment for pollsters over “false, misleading, or incomplete” opinion polls.
The bill prepared by MHP deputy chair Mevlüt Karakaya mentioned that a professional standard requirement is needed for surveys, the daily BirGün reported on July 13.
One of the article in the bill demands a jail term from two to five years for “a researcher or the responsible manager of a public opinion research institution, who provides false, misleading or incomplete information with the aim of directing or influencing the public positively or negatively about an institution, organization, product, service or person, contrary to the conditions and principles determined by this Law.”
Many polling firms failed to predict the outcome of the presidential election on May 14.
Opinion polls from numerous companies had for weeks shown Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu in front of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, appearing to chime with perceptions that his popularity had been sapped by soaring inflation and a cost-of-living crisis.
Government executives argued that those polling firms “intentionally” showed Kılıçdaroğlu ahead to “manipulate” election results.
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