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Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s rival, Kemal Kiliçdaroglu, launched his campaign for the second round of the presidential elections on Thursday, May 17. The opposition candidate, who won 44.9% of the vote on May 14 compared to 49.5% for the outgoing president, puts a nationalist spin on his speech in hopes of expanding his constituency.
Kemal Kiliçdaroglu changes strategy. The opposition candidate, who until now had refused to compete in nationalism with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and carried a so-called “positive” speech, which wanted to focus on the “real problems” of the Turks, starting with the economy, is hardening his campaign, according to our correspondent in Istanbul, Anne Andlauer. “I will send all the refugees home as soon as I come to power,” she said in Ankara in her first public speech since the May 14 first round.
“If they stay,” he continued, referring to the current head of state and his government, “more than 10 million additional refugees will arrive in Turkey.” “Can you imagine? If they stay, the dollar will be worth 30 Turkish pounds, a bar bread will cost 10 pounds, misery will increase, these illegal immigrants, these refugees will become crime machines, looting will begin… Do you realize? Mafia clans and drug lords. Can you imagine? If they stay, femicides will increase and young women will no longer be able to walk down the street alone,” he said.
In search of the voices of the third man
Kemal Kiliçdaroglu, who won 44.9% of the vote on Sunday against President Erdogan’s 49.5%, a difference of more than 2.5 million votes, had already promised to return all the refugees to Syria if he won, but without using those words.
The opposition tries to capture 5.2% of the votes obtained on May 14 by the ultranationalist candidate Sinan Ogan, who has not yet given voting instructions for the second round. According to the Turkish press, Sinan Ogan met on Wednesday with one of the six leaders of the opposition alliance, and could meet with Kemal Kiliçdaroglu on Friday. The ultranationalist candidate had partly focused his campaign on the expulsion of the 4 million refugees who live on Turkish soil, of which about 90% are Syrian.
