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The first polls in Turkey: Erdogan is expected to extend his rule

2023-05-28 14:22:18Kosova&Bota SHKRUAR NGA REDAKSIA VOX
The first polls in Turkey: Erdogan is expected to extend his rule
Recep Tayyip Erdogan

Turks headed back to the ballot box in a presidential runoff that could see Tayyip Erdogan extend his rule into a third decade and continue Turkey's increasingly authoritarian path, muscular foreign policy and unorthodox economic governance.

Erdogan, 69, defied opinion polls and surged to a nearly five-point lead over his rival, Kemal Kilicdaroglu, in the first round on May 14. He fell just short of the 50% needed to avoid a runoff, in a race with profound consequences for Turkey itself and global geopolitics. 

The election will decide not only who leads Turkey, a NATO member country of 85 million people, but also how it is governed, where its economy is headed after its currency has fallen to a tenth of its value. against the dollar in a decade, and the shape of its foreign policy, which has seen Turkey unnerve the West by cultivating ties with Russia and the Gulf states.

Kilicdaroglu, 74, is the candidate of a six-party opposition alliance and heads the Republican People's Party (CHP) founded by Turkey's founder, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. His camp has struggled to regain momentum after Erdogan's upset in the first round.

Initial elections showed stronger-than-expected support for nationalism, a powerful force in Turkish politics that has been hardened by years of hostilities with Kurdish militants, an attempted coup in 2016 and the influx of millions of refugees from Syria since the start of the war there in 2011.

Turkey is the world's largest host of refugees, with about 5 million migrants, of whom 3.3 million are Syrian, according to Interior Ministry data.

Kilicdaroglu, a former civil servant, has vowed to roll back many of Erdogan's sweeping changes to Turkish domestic, foreign and economic policies.

It would also revert to a parliamentary system of government, from Erdogan's executive presidential system, narrowly approved in a referendum in 2017.

"This time there is no political party on the ballot and the ballot is not one meter long. There are only two candidates and since our people will vote only for this, I believe that today's voting will end very quickly. For the first time in the history of Turkish democracy, we are witnessing a second round of presidential elections. At the same time, there is no other election in the history of the world that has such a high turnout of 90%," Erdogan said.  

"Dear members of the press, I invite all our citizens to the ballot boxes so that finally democracy and real freedoms come to our country to get rid of oppression and an authoritarian regime. Let everyone cast their vote and then protect the ballot boxes. Because these elections are being held under very difficult conditions. A whole smear campaign was launched against us. I believe in the common conscience of our people. Democracy and freedom will surely come to this country. People will be able to walk its streets in peace and criticize politicians as they want," said Kilicdaroglu.


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