Presidential elections were held in

Turkmenistan Turkmenistan ( or ; tk, Türkmenistan / Түркменистан, ) is a country located in Central Asia, bordered by Kazakhstan to the northwest, Uzbekistan to the north, east and northeast, Afghanistan to the southeast, Iran to the s ...

on 12 February 2017. This was Turkmenistan's fifth presidential election and decided who would be the country's president for the next seven years. Incumbent President

Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow Gurbanguly Mälikgulyýewiç Berdimuhamedow (born 29 June 1957), also known as Arkadag (Cyrillic: Аркадаг, "protector"), is a Turkmen politician who served as the second president of Turkmenistan from 2006 to 2022. A dentist by profe ...

won with more than 97% of the vote, similar to the results of the

2012 elections The following elections occurred in the year 2012. International * 2012 United Nations Security Council election Africa Egypt * 2012 Egyptian presidential election Mali * 2012 Malian presidential election * 2012 Malian parliamentary electio ...

. The result was widely expected; although the election was nominally contested by nine candidates, all opposition candidates were appointed by the government and the elections were regarded by foreign organisations as not being a free and fair contest.

Background

In September 2016, the

constitution A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organisation or other type of entity and commonly determine how that entity is to be governed. When these pr ...

was changed to remove term limits and the 70 year-old age limit for presidential candidates, as well as extending the presidential term from five to seven years.

Electoral system

The

President of Turkmenistan The president of Turkmenistan ( tk, Türkmenistanyň prezidenti), officially the president and chairman of the Cabinet of Ministers of Turkmenistan, is the head of state and head of government of Turkmenistan. The president is also the supreme c ...

is elected using the

two-round system The two-round system (TRS), also known as runoff voting, second ballot, or ballotage, is a voting method used to elect a single candidate, where voters cast a single vote for their preferred candidate. It generally ensures a majoritarian resu ...

Candidates

The Democratic Party nominated the incumbent President,

, who won 97.14% of the vote in the previous elections. A total of 9 candidates were approved by the Central Election Committee. The opposition candidates' manifestos were published in the state-controlled mass media.

Results

References

{{Turkmenistani elections

Presidential election A presidential election is the election of any head of state whose official title is President. Elections by country Albania The president of Albania is elected by the Assembly of Albania who are elected by the Albanian public. Chile The p ...

Presidential elections in Turkmenistan February 2017 events in Asia Election and referendum articles with incomplete results