By: Mia Holmberg Karlsson/TT
Published: Less than 10 min ago
1 of 4Photo: Francisco Seco/AP/TT
Turkey’s opposition is broken. In Sunday’s second round of elections, the chances of a change of power in Ankara look extremely slim.
Instead, Turkey is predicted to become more authoritarian and nationalist as Recep Tayyip Erdogan heads for another term. For both the Turkish economy and Sweden’s NATO application, it is a gloomy message.
The election on 14 May was a shock for the opposition. Incumbent President Erdogan secured 49.5 percent, while the challenger Kemal Kiliçdaroglu, who, carried by historically good opinion figures, seemed to be on a winning streak until the end, received just under 45 percent of voter support.
– Erdogan’s dominance over the media, the institutions and the treasury paid dividends and the attempts to vote out an authoritarian system failed, says Bitte Hammargren, journalist and author who has long covered Turkey and the Middle East.
Ahead of Sunday’s second round of elections, which had to take place when none of the candidates reached 50 percent, the opposition’s hopes seem to have been dashed. Erdogan is only around 550,000 votes away from victory, while Kiliçdaroglu needs to find the support of at least another 2.7 million Turks. For Bitte Hammargren, who recently published the book “Drama without end: Turkey 100 years”, the choice is made.
– Those who did unexpectedly well in the election were Turkish nationalists in various constellations. Kiliçdaroglu must now mobilize partly those who voted for him in the first round, i.e. also Kurds, partly Turkish nationalists and therein lies an insoluble contradiction.
Ultranationalist support
The chances did not get any better with Monday’s announcement from the ultra-nationalist Sinan Ogan, who reached just over five percent in the first round. Ogan then said he backs Erdogan, which is believed to make it even more difficult for Kiliçdaroglu to attract Ogan’s voters.
– With Ogan behind him, Erdogan can continue to ride the Turkish nationalist wave. That makes it more difficult for Kiliçdaroglu to win enough votes from Ogan’s camp that it would actually change something, says Bitte Hammargren.
For Sweden, the Turkish election has primarily been about which president would approve Sweden’s NATO application the fastest. Kiliçdaroglu has promised to end Turkey’s opposition to Sweden joining NATO in the event of an election victory. With Erdogan, things look darker.
Continue braking?
In an interview with CNN last week, the president claimed that Turkey is still not ready to admit Sweden into the defense alliance. The big question is what happens at the NATO summit in Lithuania in July, says Bitte Hammargren.
– Some Turkish observers believe that Erdogan cannot continue to stop Sweden in Vilnius. But he wants something back. The question is what will be enough for him to be able to show his voters that he got something.
Another term of office with Erdogan at the helm means that Turkey will become increasingly authoritarian – at the same time as the global trend of authoritarian rule through ballot boxes is strengthened, according to Hammargren. Many in the opposition fear “the worst”: that Erdogan will remain in office for life.
“The economy is bleeding”
For ordinary Turks, the question of the crippled economy is perhaps the most central. In recent years, rampant inflation has drastically lowered people’s living standards. As the results of the first round of elections were announced, the Istanbul stock exchange fell and the Turkish lira steamed to a new low-water mark against the dollar.
Erdogan went to the elections with high-flying economic promises – but the resources to fulfill them do not exist, says Bitte Hammargren.
– The economy is Erdogan’s Achilles heel when he is to continue to lead the country. The Turkish economy is bleeding and the foreign exchange reserve is almost depleted.
FACTS
The election in Turkey
On May 14, Turkey held presidential and parliamentary elections. 64 million were eligible to vote, of which 61 million live in the country.
When the votes were counted, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had received 49.5 percent of the vote and challenger Kemal Kiliçdaroglu 44.9. The third presidential candidate, Sinan Ogan, received 5.2 percent.
Since no one secured more than 50 percent of the vote, a second election round will be held on Sunday, May 28. Then the battle is only between Erdogan and Kiliçdaroglu.
The country’s largest party, the AKP, founded by Erdogan, has ruled Turkey since 2002. But after a period of economic instability and accusations of increasingly authoritarian rule, support has waned.
Ahead of the May 14 election, most of the opposition came together in a broad coalition of parties from widely varying backgrounds.
Presidential candidate Kiliçdaroglu leads the largest party in the opposition, the CHP. The party was founded by the father of the country, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, and traditionally describes itself as secular and social democratic.
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