With the elections second round of elections taking place on the 28th May with two candidates in the Presidential race, and the choice was between the current President of 20 years President Tayyip Erdogan and his opponent Kemal Kilicdaroglu.
Middle East Monitor
Election season is officially in, and it was recently Turkey’s turn to decide whether they wanted to make a change or let the current leader continue his leadership.
Though the 2023 election in Turkey was pretty much predictable as the country has had the same President for over 20 years, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, following the earthquake that took place in the borders of Turkey and Syria which followed an economic and humanitarian crisis that left many wondering whether this election season would bring up a new perspective and a fresh start for the country’s political field.
With the second round of elections taking place on the 28th of May 2023, voters had two candidates in the Presidential race, and the choice was between the current President of 20 years President Erdogan and his opponent Kemal Kilicdaroglu. In order to better understand the choices that the voters had to make it is important to know the promises and the driving factor behind the Presidential campaign for both parties.
When it came to President Erdogan, his policies for this election heavily focused on the country coming together in order to fight the ever-worsening inflation issue in the country and heal the wounds from the catastrophic earthquake that took place just a few months ago. And while President Erdogan could easily be known as one of the longest-serving President of Turkey, he is also well-known as the only serving democratic President of the country, elected on August 10, 2014, after gaining popularity for his accomplishments in bringing about democracy, transparency and overall progress to the nation.
The opponent, Kemal Kilicadaroglu was driven to get into the field of politics due to the ever-increasing debt which strongly affected the working class in Turkey, only getting worse following the earthquake which took place in February 2023. Kilicadaroglu, though not quite as popular as his opponent during the early years of his political career due to his political party, the Republic People’s Party's (CHP) efforts towards a secular Turkey, which rubbed people the wrong way.
Though Kilicadaroglu had his own policies which were attractive to many such as his drive towards a secular Turkey, due to his stances on matters such as finding Syrian refugees a ‘burden’ as well as the Hijab issue left President Erdogan a popular candidate who was extremely hard to beat.
When it came down to it, voters cast their popular vote, elongating the current ruling into a third decade of President Erdogan’s presidency.
Though the votes did not immediately elect the president as there had to be a run-off due to none of the candidates making it to 50 percent of the votes, after a second round of voting for the first time ever in Turkey, the President yet again won the election.
While many took to the streets to celebrate this win, the opposing candidate Kilicadaroglu stated that this was a ‘sad day for the country’ claiming that the election was extremely unfair calling the current Government an authoritarian one.
