Erdogan faces the biggest political challenge since his Justice and Development Party came to power in 2002. Polls show public support for Erdogan has declined in recent years as the Turkish lira has fallen in value and inflation soared. Opponents blame the president’s economic policies for the problems faced by the Turks.
In the presidential elections in May, Erdogan will face the candidate of the main opposition alliance, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, and two other candidates. According to a Metropoll poll, 42.6% of respondents said they would vote for Kılıçdaroğlu and 41.1% for Erdoğan in the first round of voting. The remaining candidates together received the support of 7.2% of voters.
Support for Erdogan dipped slightly after the February earthquakes that killed more than 50,000 people in Turkey, according to polls, as many Turks felt the authorities’ initial response to the disaster was too slow.
“We will completely heal the wounds inflicted by the disaster in 11 provinces and their neighboring cities by building a total of 650,000 new houses, of which 319,000 will be put into use within a year,” Erdogan promises.
Seeking to extend his two-decade term, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan began his campaign by promising to bring inflation down to single digits and boost economic growth. At the same time, according to Al Jazeera, the Turkish president repeated his economic mantra that investment, production, exports and a possible current account surplus will lead to an increase in Turkey’s gross domestic product.
“We will bring inflation down to single digits and save our country from this problem for good,” the president promised his constituents.
Erdogan pushed for aggressive interest rate cuts implemented by Turkey’s central bank, which propelled inflation to a 24-year high of over 85% in October before falling to nearly 50% in March. The ensuing cost-of-living crisis engulfed Turkish households and reduced incomes and savings, reducing people’s purchasing power, Al Jazeera notes.
“We will further strengthen investment with a framework based on a free market economy integrated into the world,” the ruling Justice and Development Party said in a manifesto. The policy paper targets 5.5% annual growth from 2024 to 2028 and $1.5 trillion in GDP by the end of 2028. In 2022, GDP was just over $1 trillion of dollars.
Erdogan said last week that the team was working to strengthen economic policy under the leadership of former finance minister Mehmet Simsek, who is highly respected by international investors. Some AKP members have previously said they would like Shimshek to advocate for a move towards freer market policies.
As for foreign policy, the outgoing president said he would continue to normalize relations in the region. Ankara recently moved to mend relations with Israel, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Syria after years of tension.
Erdogan says Turkey can negotiate with both sides in the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, “make concrete progress, such as a grain corridor and a prisoner swap, and we can still talk about the possibility of peace.”
In early April, the Turkish president said his supporters should teach the United States a lesson in the upcoming presidential and legislative elections. Before that, as observers note, Erdogan (unusually) avoided criticizing the West and the United States during the current election campaign, but made an exception during a rally in the Bagcilar district of Istanbul, where he had officially opened a number of public buildings. and investments.
Turkey’s president called US Ambassador Jeff Flake’s visit to the only opposition presidential candidate Kemal Kılıçdaroglu a reason for his anger at the United States.
“We have to teach America a lesson in this election,” Erdogan said. – Joe Biden says from there, what is Ambassador Biden doing here? He is going to visit Mr. Kemal. It’s a shame, use your head. You are an ambassador. Your contact here is the president.
Speaking of Jeffrey Flake, Erdogan said: “How are you going to ask the president to meet now? Our doors are now closed to him. You can’t see me anymore. For what? You will know your limit. You will know your duty as an ambassador. You will learn how an ambassador works.
And in February, Turkish Interior Minister Suleiman Soylu accused US Ambassador Flake of trying to overthrow the government by creating “discord” and told him to “get his dirty hands off of Turkey”.
Between formally considered allies and strategic partners of the United States and Turkey, very difficult relations have developed in recent years, largely due to the fact that Washington actively supports Kurdish armed groups in Syria, which Ankara regards as terrorists. And that’s not to mention other “bottlenecks” – from Turkey’s purchase of Russian-made S-400 air defense systems to Ankara’s decision to suspend Sweden’s application for participation in the NATO.
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Even with opposition presidential candidate Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu ahead in the polls, it seems hard to believe Erdoğan will lose, Foreign Policy notes. The publication recalls that he has been in power – first as prime minister and then as president – since 2003. Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party (AKP) have reshaped political institutions to secure their power. The Turkish president has used the state apparatus to undermine the positions of his opponents, and most Turkish media now operates in the channel determined by the authorities. The judiciary, once a stronghold of the secular nationalist establishment, is now under the influence of AKP supporters. And the military command is also loyal to Erdogan.
But the catastrophic earthquake of February 6 appears to be a black swan for the current Turkish president. The victory of the opposition candidate should therefore not be ruled out.
“What would a hypothetical Kılıçdaroğlu victory mean for Turkish politics and Ankara’s foreign policy?” asks Foreign Policy.
Some Turkish and Western commentators believe that Turkey can once again be democratic, prosperous, ready to apply for European Union membership and interact better with its NATO allies.
But as Western analysts acknowledge, it is difficult to say what Kılıçdaroğlu and his partners believe in and how they will govern the country. The “National Alliance” (also known as the “Table of Six”), led by Kılıçdaroğlu, is an ideologically diverse coalition united, perhaps, by hatred of Erdoğan alone. Besides the Republican People’s Party, Kılıçdaroğlu, considered centre-left and nationalist, the opposition alliance includes an offshoot of Turkey’s far-right nationalists called the Good Party; two centre-right parties led by defectors from the ruling AKP and another centre-right group, the Democratic Party. The conservative nationalist-religious “Bonheur” party also joined the opposition bloc.
The National Alliance has issued a lengthy Memorandum of Understanding on Common Policy which, given the unwieldy nature of the coalition, is an ideological set of initiatives with nine main sections and numerous sub-sections that affect the system judiciary, mining, tourism, etc.
As well as antagonizing Erdogan and the AKP, the opposition’s stated determination to abandon the ‘executive presidency’ that Erdogan won six years ago – and which has significantly consolidated his power – is at the heart of the appeal of the alliance for the Turks. Instead, the National Alliance advocates a “reinforced parliamentary system”.
But Western observers remain skeptical even if Kılıçdaroğlu wins, because fundamental changes in Turkey’s political institutions will not be as easy as opposition leaders assume.
Calls on Western analysts and the democratic beliefs of 74-year-old Kilychdaroglu. “How can you be sure,” argues Foreign Policy, “that once firmly established as president, Kılıçdaroğlu will want to step down as executive chairman? After all, politicians generally like to hoard power, not give it away. Moreover, the new Turkish president risks facing a vicious and vindictive opposition determined to defeat him. An executive presidency would be an advantage in a stab at the AKP and its partner, the Nationalist Movement Party.
As for the foreign policy course, the National Alliance declares that it will put an end to Turkey’s foreign policy activity. At the same time, the opposition coalition wants to relaunch the EU accession process and force Turkey to comply with the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights. The platform also says it will “take initiatives” to return to the joint F-35 fighter jet program, presumably by returning Turkey’s acquired S-400 air defense systems to Russia.
At the same time, Kilicdaroglu promises to normalize relations with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. It is therefore very likely that Damascus will be one of the first visits of Kılıçdaroğlu as head of the Turkish state (of course, in the event of a theoretical victory).
At the same time, the United States is not mentioned in the National Alliance platform. This is likely because the Turks have long had clearly negative views on Washington’s foreign policy.
Notably, Kılıçdaroğlu has visited the United States twice in the past 10 years, both times, Foreign Policy notes, each time trying to minimize or even hide his trip from the Turkish press and his opponents: relations are important for Ankara, and do not bode well for bilateral relations.
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