Erdogan nominated for Turkish presidential elections

Although the elections will not be until 10th of August, the race for the Presidency in Turkey has started on Tuesday with the announcement of the current Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan as the candidate of the ruling Party for Justice and Development.

Erdogan is in power since 2003 and is currently serving his third term as prime minister. The Presidency for the first time in Turkey will be decided by direct popular vote, that would allow Erdogan to continue to maintain a certain portion of power.

The other candidate who has chances of beating is Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, a former diplomat and scholar from the main opposition group, the People’s Republican Party, and the Nationalist Movement Party.

However, there are few who believe in the ability of  Ihsanoglu, former secretary general of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and barely known until a few days ago in Turkey, to defeat the charismatic and controversial Erdogan, a politician for whom half the country feels devotion while the other half would not want to see him in power.

In the event that no candidate gets more than half of the ballots, a second round between the top two would take place, predictably Erdogan and Ihsanoglu. In this case the role of the third candidate, Selahattin Demirtas, the pro -Kurd Peoples Democratic Party would increase .

The Kurds are the largest minority in Turkey and make up about 20 percent of the population, so Demirtas to support either candidate in a hypothetical runoff could be key.

The presidential elections come at a tense moment in Turkish politics. Much of society opposes what it sees as an “authoritarian ” attitude of the prime minister, accusing him of lust for power and trying to impose his conservative vision of society to the whole country. In addition, last December a corruption scandal surfaced that splashed the Executive and forced the resignation of four ministers. In a series of recordings whose authenticity still to be confirmed, Erdogan himself appear to allegedly involved in corruption.

But this did not stop in the local elections in March, the AKP was maintained as the largest party, with about 45 percent of the vote, which portends a victory of the current prime minister in the presidency. Moreover, in recent days there have been surveys in the local press giving Erdogan’s victory in the first round with between 55 and 56 percent of the ballots.

The figure of the president in Turkey is neutral and largely ceremonial, and person holding the position is forced to resign from his party and his seat. The president is elected every five years and now the slot is held by Abdullah Gul, another leader of the AKP before becoming president, who has been limited to sign the laws passed by Parliament and has made appeals for calm in times of political tension.

However, that is not the idea of the presidency Erdogan and his closest associates have in their mind. The prime minister and his party have suggested that the popular vote this year will give the new president more power than it now holds up. In addition, AKP also has been indicating to amend the Constitution to give the president’s executive capacities and without giving up his party poistion. Assuming the popularity of Erdogan, the AKP hopes to increase its parliamentary majority in the general election in 2015 enabling it to change the Constitution in this regard.

“This way, Erdogan would be president as a member of a political party (AKP) and continue serving our people until 2023,” Mehmet Ali Sahin, AKP vice president and former minister said openly four weeks ago in a televised interview. In his speech after being re-elected party president for the last time in 2012, Erdogan himself had implied that he will remain in effect until 2023. That year the centennial of the Turkish Republic met and the AKP has set what it calls “Vision 2023”, a series of objectives which include making Turkey one of the 10 largest economies in the world.

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Posted by Jamshed Sindhu on Jul 2 2014. Filed under Latest News, World. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.