President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s municipal election campaign rests on two pillars. The first relates to the Justice and Development Party's (AK Party) ongoing success and vision for the future – which its election manifesto highlighted with reference to resilient cities and public services and works. The movement showcased its ability by delivering homes to the survivors of the Feb. 6, 2023 earthquakes earlier this week. That Erdoğan’s administration built 75,000 homes by the disaster’s anniversary and pledged to increase that number to 200,000 by the end of 2024 sent a clear message to the electorate: “The AK Party is great at solving problems, implementing projects and delivering services. No other party can compete with it in those fields.”
The second pillar of Erdoğan’s campaign rests on his criticism of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) – which makes sense because the CHP formed the opposition’s ill-fated coalition in May 2023 and remains in charge of several major cities, including Istanbul and Ankara. It is also quite natural for the president to take jabs at the CHP chairperson personally. Now that “Mr. Kemal” has been replaced, Erdoğan talks about “Özgür Effendi” and how the "table for six" was a plot and how the CHP has a poor track record regarding Türkiye’s interests including the fight against terrorism.
Obviously, the Turkish president’s decision to highlight the opposition’s fragmentation and especially the intra-CHP power struggle was essential from the standpoint of party politics. That high level of fragmentation certainly supports the argument that the Turks cannot afford to let the opposition take the wheel. Moreover, the selection of mayoral candidates has reflected the three-way split of power between Chairperson Özgür Özel, Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoğlu and former Chairperson Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu – which proved useful for Erdoğan.
At the same time, CHP-affiliated mayors have been complaining about the new party leadership’s attempts to kick out “Kurds, Alevis and Kılıçdaroğlu’s supporters.” That, too, makes it possible for the president to talk about a “civil war” inside the main opposition party.
Kılıçdaroğlu recently said that he hasn’t retired from politics, adding that he was meeting regularly with a group of academics to discuss Türkiye’s and global problems – which suggests that he is waiting for the day after the municipal election. Does this mean that the former chairperson hasn’t completed his mission and would like to reclaim his seat under the right circumstances? Such questions not only widen the gap between one part of the CHP, which focuses on March 31, and another part that eagerly awaits April 1. They also create opportunities for President Erdoğan to bring up “Mr. Kemal” on occasion. By reminding everyone of the opposition’s most recent defeat, the president prepares his party for victory.
The selection of mayoral candidates undermined the CHP’s claim to “change” and effectively became its soft underbelly. Let us recall that the opposition’s main weakness related to the selection of a joint presidential candidate in May 2023. This time around, a similar problem is accompanied by a debate over cooperation. Despite realizing that, the opposition cannot reverse its course.
Whether the Green Left Party (YSP), informally known as the Peoples' Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party), will field its own candidates and, if yes, what kind of candidates it will choose will be obviously significant for the metropolitan races in Istanbul, Ankara and elsewhere. Even more important is that communicating the services and vision of CHP-affiliated mayors has been put on the back burner. Indeed, the CHP and other opposition parties haven’t even published their election statements. To make matters worse, opposition candidates will attack each other on the campaign trail, aggravating the seeming “chaos” in their ranks.
The main opposition party is in no shape to create the same momentum as in 2023 – let alone 2019. The governing party, in turn, will make sure that the CHP doesn’t forget about its defeat in May 2023.
