Kilicdaroglu does not appear to be pro-Putin. He is not the front man for a conservative Islamist party. So on the surface this seems good if he wins. Does anyone know more about who he is and what he wants to do? The second story I linked sounds very positive. Especially the claims he’ll give back independence to the judiciary. That one sound super positive.
It looks like this election is mostly about economics, especially insanely high inflation.
Anyway, I’m looking for more information from people that follow the politics of the region more closely.
Well, Kilicdaroglu is seen as more of a secularist and more pro-West (my info largely comes from a N.Y. Times analysis), plus his CV boasts that he was once named “Bureaucrat of the Year” (how exciting).
Erdogan has been contemptuous, saying at a campaign event: “Mr. Kemal, you can’t even lead a sheep, you can’t.”
Oooh, the burn.
Hoping Erdogan gets the boot. I’m expecting a runoff.
I’m curious what odds are that Erdogan will rig the results. I can’t imagine him allowing a fair vote. Maybe I’m too jaded and someone can convince me otherwise but I find it highly unlikely he will go quietly.
Russia clearly would prefer to keep Erdogan in place. Erdogan would like to keep Erdogan in place. State controlled media will continue to promote Erdogan. I’m puzzled why people expect any runoff result other than Erdogan winning.
I would really like to understand why there is any hope Erdogan will be defeated and leave office.
While I agree with the above, I suspect a lot of us are also worried that even if the results of the runoff were in favor of Erdogan’s challenger, that he would not accept it. The anti-democratic efforts he’s put forth over the years far outweigh the efforts of the Republican party in the US and I suspect he’s got more than enough hardliner and military support to ride out any protests if he pulls a Trump and claims any results that shows him losing are fake.
I guess I wasn’t clear in my previous posts - I’m worried about EXACTLY this and would like to know why anyone thinks Erdogan will accept election results that don’t favor him.
Is there any evidence Erdogan will leave office peacefully? I see nothing to suggest that will happen regardless of the actual vote results. Have I missed something or is the media simply misleading us in suggesting Turkey is still a democracy?
It’s not just about the Presidency, AIUI. Whether the opposition coalition will be in a position to get through the reforms Kılıçdaroğlu wants - that’s another matter.
My understanding is that he’s quite centrist - with “centrist” meaning central for Turkey, not for the USA. So my guess would be that he’s not going to be some European dream replacement for Erdogan but, maybe, more like a minor “undo”, taking Turkey back to how it was 8-12 years ago - under Erdogan - rather than how it is today.
In general, the Turks have been fairly happy with Erdogan. But he has been trending away from working for Turkey and towards working for Erdogan, himself. An earlier Erdogan is, realistically, a better one.
In general, I’d expect Kılıçdaroğlu to probably keep most policy that’s currently in place, in place, but to temper it. I don’t think he’ll go for rocking any boats, just doing things like saying, “Well, yes, you still can’t say anything negative about Turkey or Turkishness, but we’ll fine you rather than locking you up.” Or, “Yes, we still need Sweden to turn over Kurdish terrorists before we’ll accept them into NATO, but we’ll limit our invasions into Northern Syria to targeted, special ops against groups that we can convince our allies have acted in terroristic ways.”
The Wikipedia article not only has the ipa, it has a little button where you can listen to it. It’s quite difficult. I think “KEM-all killitch-dar-OH-loo” is as close as is reasonable for someone who doesn’t speak or read Turkish, which includes me.
