The Social Democratic Populist Party (Turkish: Sosyaldemokrat Halkçı Parti) was a Turkish social-democratic party, which resulted from the fusion, in 1985, of the Social Democracy Party (Sosyal Demokrasi Partisi, SODEP) of Erdal İnönü and the People's Party of Aydın Güven Gürkan, both founded in 1983 with the return to democracy after the military coup of 1980. In the local elections 1989 the SHP emerged as the strongest party with 27.8 percent of the vote, winning government power in 6 metropolitan areas, 39 provinces and 283 districts.[1] The Kurdish question placed the party under serious strain as it had seven MPs of Kurdish origin at a time when use of the Kurdish language was forbidden in public and private life in Turkey. Some of these MPs wanted to take part in the Kurdish Conference in Paris 1989, to which chairman İnönü wanted to agree.