Turkish lawmakers on Wednesday passed for the second time a key banking reform sought by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) under a 10-billion-dollar stand-by program.
The parliament adopted the bill without changes, defying President Ahmet Necdet Sezer who vetoed the reform in July before the assembly went into summer recess and sent it back for reconsideration.
Sezer had raised legal objections to two articles, one regulating staff appointments to banking watchdogs and another pertaining to procedures on the functioning of social security funds.
Without a second veto right on the law, the president now has to approve it but can still ask the constitutional court to annul the measure.
The banking reform, which aims to strengthen the country's financial sector by enhancing the monitoring of banks and better regulating savers' interests, is one of the key elements in the stand-by deal Turkey agreed with the IMF in May.
The programme suffred a blow in July when the IMF refused to release a planned 800-million-dollar instalment for Ankara on grounds that the Turkish parliament failed to adopt a law reforming the country's troubled social security system before the agreed deadline.