the republican people's party (chp), turkey's principal center-left party has a traditionally strong presence across the political landscape of muğla province, closely followed by the traditional center-right represented by the democrat party (dp) in turkey's politics, although the incumbent justice and development party (akp) obtained the first place in the ballots cast during the last national-scale elections that were the 2004 local elections, with 31,25% of the votes. the overall percentage for the province was 26,3% for the chp, and 20,98% for the dp during the same elections. the rightist nationalist movement party (mhp), campaigning on turkish nationalism had obtained a further 9,5% (especially in the fethiye district). the other parties registered less significant percentages.