Since Recep Tayyip Erdogan came to the presidency of Turkey almost a decade ago after another ten years as prime minister, he has pursued a political strategy based on survival. Time and again he has used all the tools in his hand to conquer, retain and concentrate more and more power.
In 2017, for example, he submitted to a referendum a constitutional reform to replace the then parliamentary system with a presidential one, which opened the door for be head of state until 2029. A year later he brought forward the elections, scheduled for 2019, before a foreseeable economic whirlwind unleashed. In 2022 he repeated the play and now, he is running for the May 14 elections despite the fact that he had to do so reinterpret the Constitution.
And it is that this establishes that you can only opt for a maximum of two terms five-year presidential terms, which, in theory, invalidates the candidacy of the current president. However, the Turkish leader has claimed that the standard was introduced in 2017, which leaves his first term aside. Despite this small victory, Erdogan faces the toughest choice of his entire career, which could come to an end this spring.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in a file image.
The man who could unseat Erdogan is none other than Kemal Kilicdaroglu, former public official and leader of the opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP). It is not the first time that this 74-year-old politician has tried, since he has been repeatedly defeated by the current president. However, five years ago he managed to defeat the ruler AK Party (AKP) in Istanbul and other big cities in local elections. Now, it has taken advantage of that tailwind.
Earlier this month, Kilicdaroglu was nominated for a six party alliance of the opposition popularly known as the “Table of Six” to compete against Erdogan. His path to getting elected has not been easy. The opposition bloc has spent months trying to agree on who will be the candidate and was on the verge of imploding on at least one occasion, when the president of the nationalist Iyi party, meral aksener, He opposed vehemently to Kiliçdaroglu’s candidacy for not considering him charismatic enough.
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In this sense, it is not surprising that most polls rank Kilicdaroglu well ahead of Erdogan, giving him up to ten points ahead. This is the case of a query published by Aksoy Research last Saturday and carried out on March 8, in which it was indicated that the opposition leader had 55.6% support compared to 44.4% for Erdogan. In the same vein, a survey carried out on March 6 and 7 by Alf Research showed Kilicdaroglu at 55.1% and Erdogan at 44.9%, according to the news agency. Reuters.
Turkey’s opposition bloc names Kilicdaroglu as its candidate in May elections.
“The Turkish Ghandi”
Before entering the shifting sands of politics, Kilicdaroglu worked in the Ministry of Finance and then, in 1990, chaired the Turkish Social Insurance Institutionan entity that Erdogan has frequently disparaged in public.
Born in eastern Tunceli province, Kilicdaroglu is alevi, a heterodox minority that represents between 15% and 20% of the 85 million inhabitants of Turkey. His name rose to fame six years ago, when he launched his initiative march for justice, a 450 km journey from Ankara to Istanbul to protest the arrest of a deputy from his party. It was then that the Turkish media began to nickname him the Gandhi Kemal for his slight resemblance to the Indian activist.
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Now, as the main opposition leader, Kilicdaroglu is seeking to win votes with promises based on reversing many of Erdogan’s authoritarian policies. Among them he has pledged to restore the independence of the central bank and reverse economic measures unorthodox currently in force.
“We are going to govern Turkey with consultations and compromises,” Kilicdaroglu assured a few weeks ago before several thousand supporters. “Together we will establish the rule of morality and justice,” he added. However, despite its democratic proclamations, there are many who ask if the serious and sometimes energetic Kilicdaroglu can defeat Erdogan, who has managed to become the second most powerful man in the country’s history, second only to the founding father of Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.
