Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan
Turkish President Recep Tayyip ErdoganReuters

Turkey will go to snap elections, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced Friday, after Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu returned the mandate to form a government earlier this week. Elections are expected to be held on November 1, 2015. 

Davutoglu, who is also the chairman of the Islamist Justice and Development (AK) Party, told Erdogan that despite his best efforts he could not find any possibility to form a coalition government.

The ruling party came first in elections in June but lost its parliamentary majority for the first time in more than a decade, forcing it to seek a coalition partnership. Coalition-building efforts with Turkey's pro-secular party had collapsed last week.

AKP was given the option of allowing another party - main opposition party the Republican People's Party (CHP) - the chance to form a government, but Erdogan has apparently decided to favor another chance to regain AKP's former power. 

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan wanted to change the constitution to grant him greater powers than he currently wields - a chance that was lost after the June elections. 

The AKP party lost its majority on the back of growing corruption scandals, as well as alarm by many - particularly young, secular Turks and members of the country's Kurdish minority - over Erdogan's attempts to alter the constitution to give himself even greater powers. The AKP party would have needed a two-thirds majority to have enacted the sweeping changes Erdogan was seeking.

(Arutz Sheva’s North American desk is keeping you updated until the start of Shabbat in New York. The time posted automatically on all Arutz Sheva articles, however, is Israeli time.)