Kuwaiti voters head to polls to elect new parliament amid political gridlock

By Zeynep Tufekci Gulay

ISTANBUL (AA) - Kuwaiti voters on Tuesday are heading to the polls to elect the new parliament for the third time in three years amid a political gridlock.

Over 793,000 eligible voters have begun casting their ballots to elect 50 deputies of the 65-seat parliament, according to the state news agency KUNA.

The voting will be held at 8 a.m.-8 p.m. local time (0500GMT-1700GMT).

Some 207 candidates, 17 of them women, are competing to represent Kuwaitis for four years in the National Assembly which was established in 1963.

Since its establishment, the Kuwaiti parliament has witnessed many political crises and has been dissolved 11 times in the past 12 years.

Early in May, Crown Prince Sheikh Mishal al-Ahmad al-Sabah issued a decree dissolving parliament amid a feud between the assembly and the government.

In March, Kuwait’s Constitutional Court annulled last year’s parliamentary elections and reinstated the previous parliament.

The opposition won a majority in the September 2022 polls after winning 28 seats in the 50-member assembly. But the court ruled that the elections were null and void and that the previous assembly must be reinstated.

The 2020 parliament had been dissolved by a decree from the crown prince in 2022 amid a dispute between the government and the previous assembly.