At the first multi-party parliamentary elections in the Maldives on 9 May 2009, the DRP won 36% of the seats (28 out of 77 seats) in the parliament, becoming the party to win the most number of seats. However, DRP gained the second most number of votes with 27.5% of the votes (39,399 votes) compared with the 35.3% of votes (50,562 votes) gained by the Maldivian Democratic Party