Turkish people choose stability

On May 14, Turkey held one of its most critical elections in recent history. While on the one hand, the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) led by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was confident enough to win the parliamentary elections and lead the presidential one in the first round, the Nation Alliance was committed to end the two-decade-rule of President Erdoğan. President Erdoğan is seen as the favorite in the runoff presidential elections to be held on May 28 with a scorecard that includes many positive developments from democratization to gains in foreign policy, and accelerated development projects to the increasing capabilities of the Turkish defense industry. On the other hand, the Turkish opposition had claimed that they were closer than ever to ending the 21-year rule of the AK Party and its leader.

In their election campaigns, the People’s Alliance highlighted national security concerns and the moves that paved the way for Turkey’s independence in domestic and foreign policy, and the Nation Alliance conducted a campaign that focused on economic challenges and delivering unconvincing messages to the youth and women. It was clear that the Nation Alliance’s absurd proposals such as reducing onion prices instead of producing unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) which have become one of the most critical instruments of Turkey’s national security and foreign policy, drew the reaction of voters.

The elections were held in a competitive, yet democratic environment. President Erdoğan won the presidential election with 49.5 per cent of the votes, but as he did not receive the 50+1 votes required to become president, a runoff is required. The fact that the Nation Alliance received around 45 per cent of the votes revealed that the Republican People’s Party (CHP) and the other members of the coalition did not have a successful election strategy nor could they accurately understand the voting behavior of the Turkish voters.

As both domestic and international observers are trying to make sense of the election results, it would be useful to make some related observations. First, the picture that emerged with the end of the May 14 elections is that Turkish voters prioritize national security issues and projects in areas that are seen as a matter of survival for Turkey rather than focusing on economic difficulties. At this point, the decisiveness of the AK Party and the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), the two prominent components of the People’s Alliance, in the fight against terrorism and their independent foreign policy are the two most important factors that pushed Turkish voters to vote for them.

Turkey, which has become a game-changer in conflict and crisis areas in its immediate geography thanks to its defense industry, is taking important steps both to protect regional interests and increase its international reputation as a broker in Ukraine, Syria, Libya, and Azerbaijan. In addition to this, thanks to its strong UAV capacity and operational know-how, Turkey maintains its cross-border operations, and in this way, the durability and flexibility of the PKK terrorist organization in Turkey have almost ended. Although the defense industry projects introduced by the Turkish government were appreciated by almost every segment of Turkish society, the CHP developed a discursive opposition to these projects, causing them to lose votes in the May 14 elections. But what is surprising is not Erdoğan’s victory, as the Western press or the opposition in Turkey claims. After all these years, it was still Erdoğan in fact that was defining the elections as the electorate was being asked to either side with him or against him. Kılıçdaroğlu even took his election slogan from Erdoğan’s nickname for him and gladly accepted it: “(Bay Kemal) Mr. Kemal”! What is, in fact, surprising is that, yes, Erdoğan finished 5 per cent and nearly 2.5 million votes ahead of Kılıçdaroğlu, but that Kılıçdaroğlu could still collect 44.88 per cent of the votes!

This is a significant success for Kılıçdaroğlu, even though he has the full support of the Western world and that he has gathered five, large and small, political parties of various ideological orientations ranging from secular nationalist to religious conservative, plus, the HDP, the political arm of the PKK. The astonishing part of this success does not stem from the fact that he is an Alevi or, as the Armenian intellectual Sevan Nişanyan put it, “probably the most incompetent, defeatist and unrepresentative person in the history of politics, who ran and lost 10 [now 11] elections.”

What is surprising is that he achieved this vote share as the CHP leader in Turkey. As a matter of fact, the CHP, whose presidential candidate was considered the election favorite, received 25.35 per cent in the parliamentary election, 10 points behind the AK Party, which still received 35 per cent of the votes after all these years. Erdoğan, too, has had to grapple with this system from the moment he entered politics: he was banned from politics, imprisoned, his party was shut down, the party he founded was sued for closure, he was the target of military coups, and attempted military coups. Finally, in the military coup attempt on July 15, 2016, there were direct attempts to eliminate him—not by execution this time like Menderes. The coup plotters tried to kill him in the hotel where he was staying and on a plane in the air. With the bitter memory of the May 27 coup and the hanging of Adnan Menderes in mind, thousands of people said “Never Again” and took to the streets, foiling the coup attempt.

In Turkey, May 14, the 2023 election day, was also the anniversary of the transition from a one-party to a multiparty political life and the victory of the Democratic Party (DP), on May 14, 1950. DP leader Adnan Menderes was declared a “dictator” by the CHP just a week after the elections, just like President Erdoğan. May 14, 1950 marked the end of one-party political life in Turkey—in other words, the end of the CHP rule. The CHP has never even once been in power on its own, and on May 14, 2023, it received 25 per cent of the votes.

In a recent interview, Ünal Çeviköz, one of the CHP’s most important names, harshly criticized Turkey’s Libya policy and asked, “What are we doing in Libya?” However, the “Blue Homeland” Doctrine, which was put forward by Turkey regarding the protection of maritime jurisdiction areas in the Mediterranean, placed Libya at a critical point.

Politics Today