Shall we go on vacation or to the ballot box?
The Supreme Election Board (YSK) set the date of the election as Nov. 1.
The answer to “Why not Nov. 8?” came in a meteorological nature: “Weather conditions could be bad in some of Turkey’s regions.”
I surfed the internet yesterday and there was no information whatsoever that there will be major changes in the temperatures in the first week of November.
At any rate, for the past 20 years temperatures have always shown a positive deviation, with the exception of 1997 and 2011. In other words, temperatures went up.
Obviously some are suspicious about the YSK’s date choice. Due to the four-day holiday that will come with Republic Day on Oct. 29, it has been speculated those leaving for holidays will not come back to cast their votes on Nov. 1.
Some claim the date has been set as Nov. 1 so the sympathizers of the Republican People’s Party (CHP), who are fond of going on vacations, will not come back and cast their votes.
If all of those who cannot sacrifice from their vacations at a time when there is an election which will determine the fate of the country, then the problem lies with the CHP and its constituency. If this is a trap against the CHP, then the only way not to fall into this trap is to finish vacations a day early, come back and vote!
Making predictions about Erdoğan’s next moves
All of the public opinion polls except the manipulative ones or the ones that are done in order to make those who have commissioned it happy reveal the outcome of the repeated elections will not be much different.
The plans of the president and the Justice and Development Party (AKP) to push the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) below the threshold will not succeed; and actually it seems that there will be even an increase in this party’s votes.
Some research shows the number of seats that will be won in parliament by the HDP can be more than those of the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP).
In other words, there will again be four parties in parliament and there won’t be any possibility to form a government without the AKP.
There is of course more than two months to the elections and there could be incidents that can change this picture anytime.
Let’s not forget how the capture of Abdullah Öcalan, the leader of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), and his imprisonment in Turkey had registered a huge increase in the votes of the main party in the coalition of that time.
But in the absence of such a factor, the outcome is going to be the same.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan knows he cannot interfere in the coalition that will be formed and that’s the only reason why we are going to elections.
In this case I do not expect Erdoğan to accept his fate and retreat to his corner.
It should be expected that a politician with Erdoğan’s attributes should push one more time.
He might want to take initiatives that will force elections one more time or he can try another way.
And that is to form a coalition that will not function.
He has in his hands constitutional powers that enable him to do so, such as vetoing laws, refraining from agreeing to the appointments of the coalition partner, etc.
He might want to benefit from the problems of a coalition that does not function and to use the option to say to the electorate in an early election, “Look it does not work with a coalition either.”
We will see then if the AKP will become the toy of Erdoğan’s ambitions or act in conscience of the importance of the votes that the electorate casted for it.
But I can predict that the AKP will become a toy of Erdoğan’s ambitions.
