YUMAK AND SADAK v. TURKEY JUDGMENT 23 the period when the 10% threshold was in force, seven elections had produced three coalition governments and three single-party governments. These figures showed that the threshold had positive effects on governmental stability. 94. The Government further submitted that the refusal to propose policies accepted more or less generally throughout the country and cutting oneself off from the rest of the country by representing only one region or a particular constituency could not be considered compatible with the unitary structure of the State. On that point, Turkey was not alone. The MathieuMohin and Clerfayt judgment showed that even in Belgium, where there were different language groups, MPs and senators represented the Belgian nation. Similarly, Article 80 of the Turkish Constitution provided that MPs represented society as a whole. 95. The Government considered that the threshold was a proportionate measure which mainly fell within its margin of appreciation. They argued in particular that, as had been confirmed by the elections on 22 July 2007, the applicants could have been elected on 3 November 2002 if they had stood as independents or if DEHAP had formed an electoral coalition with one or more of the large parties. 96. In that connection, they submitted that the results of the parliamentary elections of 22 July 2007 corroborated the Chamber’s findings in its judgment of 30 January 2007. The members of the DTP – the party which, according to the applicants, had taken the place of the one they were members of – had stood as independent candidates in the 2007 elections and had been elected easily because as independents they were not subject to the national threshold. A few days after their election they had rejoined the DTP and formed a parliamentary group (see paragraph 25 above). Having decided that it could not cross the threshold in the 2007 elections, the DTP had urged its members to stand as independent candidates and had managed to obtain twenty seats in Parliament. It was important to note that the total number of votes obtained by the DTP’s independent candidates represented only 2.04% of the national vote, which meant that the DTP would not even have been able to reach the 5% threshold which, according to the applicants, was the expression of a “common democratic political tradition” among European countries. If the threshold had been lower – say 2% – the DTP, with 2.04% of the votes cast, would have won only one seat, or two at the most. By winning twenty seats, or 3.6% of the total number of seats in the Grand National Assembly, the DTP had managed to raise its representation in Parliament to the maximum. 97. Moreover, political parties could collaborate under the banner of a large party, even though forming joint lists was prohibited by section 16 of Law no. 2839 on the election of members of the National Assembly. The DSP, for instance, a party which had been a member of the ruling coalition from 1999 to 2002, had been unable to get over the 10% threshold in the