Turkish elections. Round 2

UA:SOUTH continues to follow the elections in Türkiye. This time, we provide an overview of the campaigns of the two main opponents on the eve of the second round

On Sunday, Turks will elect a president between the current head of state, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and the head of the Republican People's Party, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu.

On May 14, Erdoğan received the support of 49.52% of voters, his opponent - 44.82%.

The third number of the race - the nationalist Sinan Oğan - kept intrigue for a long time and finally decided to support Erdoğan. Instead, the parties that nominated Oğan for the presidency, supported the candidate from the opposition.

A miracle is unlikely to happen. Less than half a percent of votes prevented Erdoğan from winning already in the first round. The difference between him and Kılıçdaroğlu was more than 5% or 2.5 million votes. Oğan scored 2 million 800 thousand. Even if a tenth of his voters vote for the incumbent, Erdoğan will win the election.

Sociologists calculated: at least 30% of Sinan Oğan's voters are ready to vote for the current leader of Türkiye.

The opposition has run out of reserves. Kılıçdaroğlu hopes to increase the turnout and he appeals to the 7 million voters who did not come to the polling station on May 14. However, the turnout was still high - almost 90%. For the candidate of the six opposition parties to win, almost half of those who did not vote must be convinced to come to the elections, and all of them must vote for the opposition party.

Opponents of Erdoğan can count three things:

For the first time, Erdoğan did not win in the first round, and a second round has to be held.

For the first time, Erdoğan loses the largest cities - Istanbul and Ankara - and ceases to be the leader of the most developed part of the country.

His party received a historic low since 2002 and 7% less than in the last election.

This trend began in 2017 with a referendum on changes to the Constitution and the transition to a presidential model of government. It was preserved in the 2018 elections, where Erdoğan won 52% of the vote in the first round. In 2019, this led to the government losing mayoral seats in Ankara and Istanbul. However, this was not enough for Erdoğan's opponents to defeat him in the elections.

In October, Erdoğan will most likely celebrate the 100th anniversary of the republic as its head. However, with unresolved economic problems, a large budget and trade balance deficit, the flight of Western investors, and the gradual falling into dependence on the money of the Persian Gulf countries and Russia.

Erdoğan is proud of mega-projects such as airports, bridges, and military equipment of his own production. Türkiye is turning into a space state - and becoming an unpredictable partner of the NATO bloc.