Turkey’s Opposition Yet to Announce a Candidate Against Erdoğan

Doğukan Atmaca

In June 2015 general elections, Erdoğan’s AKP received 40,8% and lost parliamentary majority to form the government by itself. Erdoğan called a renewal of elections on November 1, winning 49% of the votes  and granting the AKP enough seats to form the government. However, between the two elections Turkey witnessed a number of terror attacks that resulted in hundreds of civilian deaths. On 13 November 2022, Turkey was hit by a bomb attack in İstanbul, the biggest metropolis of the country. Then three weeks ago, Ekrem İmamoğlu, the mayor of the İstanbul Metropolitan Municipality (İBB) was sentenced to more than two years in prison and banned from politics by a court decision.

Both cases were rumoured to be set up by Erdoğan’s government to strengthen his hand for the upcoming elections in 2023 by attracting the voters with national security threats and eliminating a powerful potential candidate before the election. İmamoğlu is considered as a strong potential candidate for the presidency against Erdoğan, so the court decision is regarded as political. It would not be too far-fetched to argue that a number of key developments in Turkey can be seen through the lens of the upcoming elections, and the Turkish electorate’s behaviour looks sensitive to certain concerns.

While Erdoğan is trying to strengthen his hand to counter the ongoing cost of living crisis in Turkey, his job approval has decreased, although he continues to be a strong candidate for the presidency. According to a Metropoll survey, 49% of the voters believe that Erdoğan will win the next elections while only 33% think the opposition leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu would win. However, the Mayor of Ankara, Mansur Yavaş and the Mayor of İstanbul, Ekrem İmamoğlu appear to be more popular among the voters. Yavaş’s popularity reaches up to 60% in the surveys although he shies away from the hot political discussions in the country. İmamoğlu follows Yavaş with around 50% popularity in the opinion polls. It may also be argued that the recent court decision about his imprisonment has increased the support he receives. 

It is interesting to observe that İmamoğlu’s popularity surpasses Kılıçdaroğlu’s despite the latter’s higher profile and fame as the leader of the main opposition party for over twelve years. The main characteristic difference between İmamoğlu and his leader Kılıçdaroğlu is that the former is a more capable speaker who can directly address the voters publicly while the latter sounds powerless and acts ineffective even under tough times like when the  Supreme Election Court (YSK) allowed unstamped ballots to be counted in the 2017 Referandum. 

The Mayor of Ankara, Mansur Yavaş, on the other hand, enjoys greater popularity although he does not necessarily comment on major political discussions. He presents a profile focusing on his mayorship duties for Ankara. His nationalist background poses a concern for the leftist voters, but yet he appears more popular than both Kılıçdaroğlu and İmamoğlu. 

On January 5th, the Table of Six (Altılı Masa) opposition group held their 10th meeting which lasted over 9 hours. Although they were expected to announce their candidate, only a list of democratic criteria was released. The paper is about how democracy should be reinstalled in Turkey after the elections expected to be held in June 2023. However, it seems like the leaders of the opposition have not clearly discussed any name as a rival of Erdoğan. Kılıçdaroğlu obviously considers himself while Meral Akşener, the leader of the Good Party (İYİP), strongly supports İmamoğlu and Yavaş. 

There is a clear support for İmamoğlu although the electorate knows him only for three years since he was announced as the candidate for the mayorship of İstanbul against former AKP PM Binali Yıldırım who has close ties with resident Erdoğan. After losing the elections to İmamoğlu on 31 March 2019, the Supreme Election Court (YSK) decided to renew the election for İstanbul, but İmamoğlu won again and increased his votes. It may be argued, however, that the success of İmamoğlu was not a result of his experience or popularity in 2019, but the hostility against Erdoğan and his government. 

The İstanbul local elections in 2019 demonstrated that the voters can vote even for someone they do not know about in order to tackle Erdoğan. However, any candidate succeeding Erdoğan will also inherit his extensive powers as the president. At this point, it is significant to choose a candidate who would commit strongly to reinstall democracy and separation of powers (trias politica). It seems easy to collect votes from any part of the society that is against Erdoğan, but the candidate needs to be chosen carefully with the post-election period in mind.

Meanwhile, Erdoğan has recently increased the pensions and the minimum wage to mitigate the high inflation caused by his unorthodox economic policies. He also mentioned that he is considering rescheduling the elections for an earlier date. In such a scenario, Erdoğan would by-pass the constitution banning him from running for the presidency for a third time and the Table of Six would have only three or four months to decide on the name of their candidate and the election campaign campaign. This is actually alarming for the opposition while strengthening Erdoğan’s hand. Their next meeting is on 26th January and it is unlikely they will announce a candidate until then. Consequently, on the one hand, voters have many reasons for not voting Erdoğan although he is offering short term compensations such as pay rises. On the other hand, the Table of Six offers only an unfinished proposal for a parliamentary democracy and presents itself mainly as a hub for anti-Erdoğan hostility.