An election victory for the opposition in Turkey is not unlikely. President Erdogan warned his supporters that this should happen. “You will pay a high price if we lose,” he said at a performance.
Shortly before the presidential elections in Turkey, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan warned devout supporters of reprisals should his secular-leaning challenger Kemal Kilicdaroglu come to power. “You will pay a high price if we lose,” Erdogan told a flag-waving crowd at a campaign event in a conservative Istanbul district.
Erdogan warned that Kilicdaroglu’s opposition alliance was driven by “revenge and greed”. The President accused the West of using the opposition as an instrument in order to impose its will on Turkish society. For the head of the Islamic conservative party AKP, who has been in power for 20 years, things could get tight on Sunday.
Kilicdaroglu wants presidential system abolish
According to most polls, his social democratic opponent Kilicdaroglu, with his alliance of six opposition parties, is ahead. In addition, the withdrawal of the secular-nationalist candidate and Erdogan adversary Muharrem Ince from the race on Thursday may have further increased the opposition’s chances.
Meanwhile, Kilicdaroglu’s CHP party said its candidate had received death threats and was wearing a bulletproof vest during campaign appearances on Friday. During an unusually brief appearance in Ankara, he told thousands of supporters: “Are you ready to bring democracy to this country? Bring peace to this country? I promise you, I’m ready too.”
The opposition candidate has announced that if he is elected, he intends to abolish the presidential system introduced by Erdogan. Among other things, parliament is to elect the head of government again in the future. For this to happen, however, the opposition would also have to win the parliamentary elections that are taking place at the same time.
Erdogan concedes difficulties a
Turkey will elect a new president and parliament on Sunday. Around 64.3 million Turks – including six million first-time voters – have been asked to vote. In another appearance this week, Erdogan admitted that it was difficult for him to win over young voters.
“There is a generation in our country that has not experienced any of the difficulties that we had,” he said, referring to the economic problems of the 1990s. And it is not easy “to convey our values to this new generation”. When asked about his forecast for the outcome of the election, Erdogan said, unusually cautious in an interview with a TV station: “The ballot boxes will show us on Sunday.”