The electoral promises of the six-party opposition alliance are nothing new because they are everything the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) has either already accomplished or is working to achieve, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan declared Saturday at an opening ceremony in the western province of Aydın.

"Those boasting of earning Europe’s favor with their program openly confess that their reins are held by imperialist colonizers," Erdoğan said, referring to the opposition’s 200-page document detailing promises of action, if elected on May 14.

The program pledges a change in the presidential term, limiting it to one term for seven years, and the abolishment of the Council of Judges and Prosecutors (HSK), excluding the justice minister from the process of assignment of judges and prosecutors. The parties promise to decrease the vote threshold to 3% for political parties to secure seats in Parliament and change the current system of the executive presidency to abolish all offices and boards under it for their authority to be handed to relevant ministries.

According to the program, Parliament will be the only authority to withdraw from international treaties that Türkiye is a party to, likely in response to Türkiye’s exit from the Council of Europe’s Istanbul Convention in 2021, which drew backlash from some opposition parties, women’s rights groups and Western countries.

For Erdoğan, the opposition’s program is nothing new because the promises are achievements that his ruling AK Party has already accomplished in the past 20 years or is in the process of carrying out.

"This program is the promise of reviving the old Türkiye, the symbol of insecurity, instability and conflict, in order to earn a ‘well done’ from their masters," Erdoğan censured.

"Mustafa Kemal Atatürk built this republic, and we have brought it to this level by fighting imperialists in every way," he underlined.

Erdoğan then announced his "challenge" once again and said his opponents would "fail in putting Türkiye in shackles again" and "the pawns of global politics will have their answer" on May 14.

Erdoğan further slammed main opposition leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, the head of the Republican People's Party (CHP), for adopting a slogan used by late Prime Minister Adnan Menderes, who was executed by the CHP administration in 1961.

"(Mr.) Kemal, how dare you steal Menderes’s slogan ‘Enough! Let the people have a say!’" Erdoğan called out. "After the late prime minister, that slogan belongs to us," he asserted.

He previously noted the slogan was composed directly in response to CHP's single-party "fascism" in late 1950s and that the CHP "needs to first learn to respect the will of the people."

The opposition’s program also includes the implementation of local administration reforms that will end the practice of appointment of trustees to municipalities whose mayors were removed on charges of corruption or links to a terrorist group, namely the Gülenist Terrorist Group (FETÖ) or the PKK.

Erdoğan often lambasts the opposition for "embracing" the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), a party affiliated with the PKK, by removing trustees and giving autonomy to municipalities.

The opposition also plans to terminate the consequences of the state of emergency decrees installed after FETÖ’s July 15, 2016 coup attempt.

Moving the presidential office in the capital Ankara from Beştepe to Çankaya, reviving the Office of the Prime Minister, opening all palaces, mansions, and other estates allocated to the Presidency for public use, and selling all presidential planes to purchase firefighting planes instead are among the promises the opposition made in its program, as well.

Removing heads of critical institutions like the army and intelligence and investigating nuclear power plants and defense projects were other pledges included in the program, which Erdoğan condemned as a "signal to the West."

On Saturday, Erdoğan accused the six parties of lacking "the courage to conjure worthwhile projects that could meet the people’s demands for rights, freedom and prosperity."

Pointing out various infrastructure development projects carried out during his rule, Erdoğan said: "We build, they only talk. When we came (into the office), there were only 26 airports, now we have 58. The roads would go 6,500 kilometers, now, we have 30,500 kilometers of divided roads."

"These parties cannot find the time for projects like these because they’re too busy kicking each other under the table," he said. "They’re receiving their instructions from the West, who will praise them for it, but we will earn our ‘well done’ from our people."

Adding that Türkiye was now on the "cusp of a critical choice," Erdoğan concluded: "We are meeting those trying to waste Türkiye’s time and energy and drag it back into chaos with the ‘Century of Türkiye’. They will not succeed in preventing the construction of this vision."

Preparations underway

Indeed, the AK Party is reportedly making final touches to the framework of its electoral declaration, which is to comprise the basis of the Century of Türkiye vision, as often hailed by Erdoğan.

Among the top five topics taking the declaration’s center stage under 23 headings, the economy will take up the first slot, with suggestions adopted by former ministers to offer concrete solutions.

The declaration also puts extra emphasis on women and young voters, stressing the institution of family and women, sources said.

The balance of security and freedom and the reinforcement of the Presidential System is the last two items the declaration will focus on.

Additionally, the AK Party has built a candidate pool of People's Alliance lawmakers in order to secure most seats in Parliament. Once which current deputies will enter the pool is determined under a commission helmed by Erdoğan, the party will be set to apply for deputy candidacy after the election date is finalized.

Mystery candidate

With a little over three months left until what has been broadly described as "the most important elections in Türkiye’s history," the six-party opposition has only been able to produce their joint policy program, while their shared candidate to challenge Erdoğan still remains a mystery.

Despite CHP officials' statement earlier in January that the bloc would name its candidate in mid-February, another official from the Good Party (IP), CHP’s main partner in the alliance, claimed there had been any discussion about it.

Following their 11th summit on Jan. 26, the party leaders revealed they discussed their "method" to determining a candidate "rather than a specific name."

So far, several names have been thrown in the hat, including Ankara and Istanbul mayors Mansur Yavaş and Ekrem Imamoğlu, alongside Kılıçdaroğlu and the IP leader Meral Akşener, while the heads of other alliance parties sought a seat in the spotlight, too.

Since Imamoglu’s candidacy, which has drawn popular support from both within the alliance and opposition supporters, stands extremely risky for the bloc due to his facing a political ban and a prison sentence in a separate case, Kılıçdaroğlu’s nomination appears to be the most likely case. The 74-year-old former civil servant’s failure to light up opinion polls, however, has so far not helped his odds.

Meanwhile, Erdoğan and his AK Party have enjoyed a boost in preelection support as their voters saw a three-point increase exceeding 41%, according to the latest polls. Erdoğan’s biggest challenge in the upcoming period will be tackling the high cost of living in Türkiye, which has been singled out as the most pressing problem faced by citizens.