If Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been shaken by the sharp-edged nature of Turkey’s crucial election, with early results suggesting the president will be forced into a first-time runoff, he didn’t show it when he addressed fervent supporters earlier in the day. on Monday morning.
Instead, as he took to the balcony of his Justice and Development Party (AKP) headquarters in Ankara, chanting with flag-waving crowds and delivering a fiery speech, he insisted that he was leading and would seal victory, whether which meant that the presidential race went to the second round or not.
His energy and confidence underlined the task facing an opposition that entered Sunday’s elections full of optimism. While he has delivered a blow to his nemesis, he seems some distance away from delivering the knockout punch against a relentless activist who has dominated Turkish politics for two decades.
Preventing the incumbent from securing an outright victory would be a first for the opposition, led by Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, who leads the Republican People’s Party, which has never won a national election against Erdoğan. But everything suggests that the momentum is in favor of Erdoğan. With 99% of ballots counted, the incumbent has 49.4% of the vote to Kılıçdaroğlu’s 45%, according to state media.
The challenge facing Kılıçdaroğlu’s six-party opposition coalition is underscored by the fact that Erdoğan’s ruling AKP, with its ultra-nationalist partner, is on track to secure a majority in parliament. This should strengthen Erdoğan’s hand ahead of any runoff, as he could tap into voters’ concerns about weak government and political instability, all as Turkey is recovering from a cost-of-living crisis that many attribute to a president who is populist and divisive in equal measure.
For some, the findings will have worrying echoes of 2018, when an opposition, galvanized in its mission to oust Erdoğan, confidently expected that economic woes would help it topple the president, only to come a distant second on the day of the elections.
This battle will enter uncharted territory if the race to secure the country’s all-powerful executive presidency goes to a second round, scheduled for May 28. But Erdoğan, who has orchestrated a dozen electoral victories since heading his power-led AKP in 2002, is clearly ready for the fight.
Shortly after the charismatic strongman’s nighttime balcony appearance, Kılıçdaroğlu, a soft-spoken retired bureaucrat, struck a defiant tone in a short statement, saying that he too was confident of securing victory in a runoff. But the setting was much more sober in an auditorium full of empty seats. And he and his allies know they are competing on an even level playing field, with the government controlling much of the media and Erdoğan brazenly willing to deploy state resources to champion his cause.
The surprise kingmaker could be Sinan Oğan, a third presidential candidate who unexpectedly garnered around 5% of the vote. Oğan is a former member of the ultra-nationalist nationalist movement, partner of the AKP in parliament. Kılıçdaroğlu’s efforts to attract his supporters may be complicated by Oğan’s hatred of the Kurdish-dominated People’s Democratic Party, which supports his presidential bid.
Erdoğan and his supporters will continue to insist, despite criticism of his economic management, that he is the only man with the experience to repair the ailing economy and rebuild after The devastating February earthquake. The shrewd and combative 69-year-old, who has served three times as prime minister and is seeking a third term as president, will likely play on people’s fears of instability in a politically polarized nation.
During the campaign, his speeches were full of diatribes against Kılıçdaroğlu, whom he accused of preparing to surrender to the IMF, of being a “drunkard”, pro-LBGT and siding with “terrorists”. Much the same can be expected.
Erdoğan will also try to exploit voters’ aversion to the feuding coalitions that ruled in the decade before the AKP came to power. While the opposition has marshalled its most united front in a bid to overthrow him, the coalition led by Kılıçdaroğlu is made up of disparate parties from across the political spectrum.
Kılıçdaroğlu will hammer on the cost-of-living crisis, hoping it will prove to be Erdoğan’s Achilles heel, with inflation rising to over 40% and the lira close to historic lows. But his challenge will be to convince hesitant voters that the president no longer represents their interests and that his coalition is stable and can bear fruit.
Even in opposition circles there have been doubts that Kılıçdaroğlu, 74, has the charisma to face Turkey’s master politician and wonders whether the coalition would not have been wiser to select a younger candidate, especially Ekrem İmamoğlu, the popular mayor of Istanbul. Depending on the final results, these doubts could resurface, particularly if the opposition’s confidence has deflated.
There is no doubt that Erdoğan is in the struggle of his political life. But once again he is proving to his critics that he should never be deleted.
andrew.england@ft.com
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