Ten days to critical election, color of politics in Türkiye is shifting

Ten days before the critical elections, current state of politics has been shifting rapidly. More precisely, it is shifting  to the direction of opposition wing, while it is almost concrete in the ruling wing.

For example, while President Tayyip Erdoğan is still giving speeches lasting no less than an hour about how many roads and airports he has built, his rival CHP leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu went beyond himself and released a one-sentence, 4-second video message on May 3rd on his Twitter account.

“If you are poorer today than yesterday, the only reason is Erdoğan,” he said in the video, which had nearly 8 million views in the first four hours.

Erdoğan and his partners have been sending out military messages, with Erdogan changing his Twitter profile picture to the one with the commander-in-chief’s uniform, while Kılıçdaroğlu has been popularizing young people making the popular hand gesture, a symbol of love, at rallies.

Yesterday, Ekrem İmamoğlu, the mayor of Istanbul, said in a meeting at Adıyaman district, “Justice has no Ekrem or Selahattin, justice is for everyone” and sent greetings to Edirne Prison where former HDP co-leader Selahattin Demirtaş has been held for over 5 years. A few hours later, Selahattin Demirtaş tweeted #PresidentKılıçdaroğlu, endosring CHP leader’s presidential candidacy, and said, “May God bless your path.”

The political paradigm is shifting

“Isn’t the dream of millions more important than your dream?” Labor party TİP’s leader Erkan Baş asked addressing third presidential candidate Muharrem İnce, who now opposes only CHP and Kılıçdaroğlu out of personal ambition.

“If you want to make Kılıçdaroğlu lose, try to make Erdoğan lose, not Kılıçdaroğlu,” Baş said.

The opposition now sees İnce’s stance as the only remaining obstacle to Kılıçdaroğlu’s victory in the first round.

The paradigm of politics has been shifting rapidly in the last three months. Three months ago, the opposition did not even have a candidate.

Two months ago, when Kılıçdaroğlu was announced as the candidate, the paradigm shifted to the question whether Erdoğan would be beated or not, no matter who the opponent was.

Now it seems that almost every color of the opposition is pushing for Kılıçdaroğlu to win in the first round, from Temel Karamollaoğlu, leader of the Felicity Party with its Islamist base, to the socialist TİP.

The other day I met with a CHP Istanbul parliamentary candidate. He excitedly told me that they were having tea conversations in the shops of conservative neighborhood shopkeepers who did not allow CHP members on their streets or greet them in the previous election.

What was shown to Kılıçdaroğlu in Van is also being shown in Uşak: The 2017 Ankara-Istanbul Justice March’s slogan “Rights, Law, Justice” appeals to all areas of politics.

Appearance in the ranks of the ruling party

The opposition can hold rallies in several cities at the same time every day. In one city Kılıçdaroğlu speaks with İmamoğlu, while in another Meral Akşener addresses the public with Mansur Yavaş.

If Erdoğan speaks at the government rallies, there is no decrease in enthusiasm, he can still gather live crowds. At yesterday’s Rize rally, for example, he himself felt uplifted. But if Erdoğan is not present, AKP supporters are less interested in ministers and MPs.

With one or two exceptions, the other leaders of the ruling People’s Alliance, with the exception of MHP leader Devlet Bahçeli, appear with Erdoğan, otherwise they are absent; they are the most passive side ornaments of politics.

Hüda-Par leader Zekeriya Yapıcıoğlu, one of the last members of the People’s Alliance, spends his election campaign in Iraqi Kurdistan Regional Government rather than in Türkiye. There is also a reaction from within the AKP against his stance against the Turkish flag, but orders come from the top to keep him in.

I wonder what would have happened if a politician from the opposition had said, the president could pardon Öcalan as he pardoned the Hezbollah leader convicted of strangling three people to death on May 2 for “being too old” at 71 years old.

Kılıçdaroğlu shook the balance of politics

Kılıçdaroğlu’s recent move, which was among the other topics of the day, was, in my opinion, a striking example of how he is trying to change the balance of politics, especially for the CHP.

He reacted harshly to social media accounts that shared images of citizens competing to get the food brought by the AK Party at Erdoğan’s İzmir rally, and criticized them.  Those who hold contempt in the efforts to bring food to the home of citizen in need “cannot be one of us,” he said. However, one of the CHP’s main propaganda materials had the claim that the AKP was “buying votes” with coal and pasta in the past. Did it work? No, it did nothing but satisfy the elitist understanding.

The effects of the preventive moves Kılıçdaroğlu initiated in 2021 are now becoming clear. I’m not just talking about visits to the Central Bank, TOBB, TÜİK, SADAT and the like. For example, the draft law prevented the AKP from further covering the headscarf issue, and the “Alevi” video prevented the AKP from further covering the issue of faith in the election campaign.

It is not yet clear whether you will see the same thing with the government’s claim that it will launch a smear campaign with “deep fake” videos through the Communications Directorate.

We will see how the shift in the color of politics will be reflected on the ballot box in ten days, not many days from now.