Portraying Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu from all angles
I am inspired by poet Hasan Hüseyin’s poem titled “Koçero,” where a bandit is depicted from the various points of view of many people, as a matter of fact, in a very effective style. I want to try a similar style where different people and segments portray the opposition's joint presidential candidate Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu. Here we go:
If you ask the veterans of the secular segments, İhsanoğlu is a person like “Morsi” in Egypt.
If you ask the bigwigs of the governments, he is a person like “el-Sisi” in Egypt.
If you ask Doğu Perinçek, the leader of Labor Party, he is a pro-American, pro-Saudi candidate.
If you ask Oktay Ekşi, former daily Hürriyet lead writer, now a main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) deputy, he would say he is doubtful whether İhsanoğlu has genuinely adopted Atatürk’s principles.
If you ask the chief adviser of the prime minister, he is an international project – the U.S. has lent a hand in this.
If you ask a pro-CHP newspaper, his wife’s head is not covered with a headscarf; thus, his wife is a candidate to become a “non-scarf wearing first lady.”
If you ask the extreme conservative daily Akit, he is a man of the parallel structure; he is in favor of coups, he is from the CHP, supports the CHP’s İsmet İnönü, etc., etc.
If you ask the ultranationalists, he is an agent trained abroad.
If you ask the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) spokesman Hüseyin Çelik, he is a candidate with zero chance of winning.
If you ask Deniz Baykal, the former chair of the CHP, he is a political Islamist.
If you ask columnist Taha Akyol, he is a local and national name.
If you ask AK Party deputy Mustafa Şentop, he was born in Egypt. He grew up in Egypt. He is a candidate transferred from Egypt.
If you ask a socialist daily Aydınlık writer, he is the son of a sheikh who ran away from the Atatürk Revolution.
If you ask the Islamist researcher, he is a pro-Baathist.
If you ask the Kemalist researcher, he is almost certain that he is anti-Atatürk.
If you ask the columnist whose heart beats for the AK Party, İhsanoğlu is a secular person who is now dancing to the CHP’s tune.
If you ask Nur Serter from the CHP, he is a dagger stuck right in the heart of the CHP.
What about the alternatives?
Will İhsanoğlu win? I don’t know, but there is one thing I know and that is the vote rates his alternatives would receive.
Let us take a look at certain individuals:
Deniz Baykal: He would get 21 percent and no more. (I am lowering the CHP’s vote because I am taking into consideration anti-Baykal people, and the wars that went on between cliques in the past.)
Yılmaz Büyükerşen: He would get his party’s vote and exceed it a little bit, just a fraction, very little, and that fraction is not very operational here.
Mansur Yavaş: Despite Devlet Bahçeli and the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) administration, would the MHP nationalists pour their votes in for Mansur Yavaş? No, at least not as much as they would for İhsanoğlu. This is not an issue to be underestimated. I don’t even mention other issues.
Emine Ülker Tarhan: She would have received her party’s vote, even with some reductions, as there are CHP members who do not agree with her views…
