ISTANBUL -
The repercussions of the devastating earthquake overshadowed the campaigns of the candidates for the Turkish presidential elections scheduled for May 14. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's campaign tended to remain silent after announcing that his campaign had abandoned the songs and music that would have been used in the electoral campaign, out of respect for the earthquake victims.
For his part, the opposition candidate, head of the Republican People's Party, Kemal Kilicdaroglu, visited Malatya, one of the states most affected by the earthquake, accompanied by the mayor of Ankara, Mansur Yavas, in his first event since his selection to be a joint candidate for the six-party table on the sixth of March.
Dealing with the effects of the earthquake, which affected more than 13 million Turkish citizens, stands out as a common field of competition between Erdogan and Kilicdaroglu, as each of them places a big bet on it to ensure winning the largest number of Turkish voters’ votes. There are other bets that the presidential candidates rely on, and in the following We go over the bets of each of the main candidates.
The effects of the earthquake emerge as a common field of competition between Erdogan and Kilicdaroglu (Al-Jazeera)
Erdogan's bets
Observers noticed a decline in the Turkish president's election campaign's preoccupation with some basic files for calculating the earthquake and dealing with its repercussions, as this file has become of the utmost importance.
President Erdogan has repeatedly pledged to rebuild what was destroyed by the earthquake in the 11 affected states within one year, and he is still conducting field inspection visits to the tented communities inhabited by the homeless due to the earthquake, and promised the citizens to transfer them as soon as possible to prefabricated, temporary mobile homes.
The Minister of Urbanization, Environment and Climate Change in the Turkish government, Murad Corum, announced that the foundations for more than 21,000 housing units in the affected areas had been laid as part of the reconstruction plan for these areas.
Reconstruction of what was destroyed by the earthquake
Turkish writer and journalist Mehmet Tahir Oglu says that the electoral calculations after the earthquake differed from what came before it. The current plan of the Justice and Development government focuses on how to return the situation to normal in the earthquake areas, shelter millions, provide them with the necessary needs, and implement the plan to build thousands of apartments.
Tahir Oglu adds - in a statement to Al-Jazeera Net - that President Erdogan wants the campaign to focus on responding to the consequences of the earthquake, and therefore he wanted it to be a campaign without music and parties out of respect for the lives of the victims, and at the same time it is a deliberate step that is expected to be in Erdogan's credit in the presidential elections.
The writer believes that Erdogan is now betting on the achievements made by his governments in terms of urban transformation and taking measures against earthquakes, blaming the opposition municipalities that were standing against urban transformation projects.
In the same context, the political analyst specializing in Turkish affairs, Firas Radwan Oglu, suggested that the electoral campaigns of the presidential candidates may tend to remain silent as the best option in light of the presence of a humanitarian disaster, but this may differ when reaching the last month before the elections.
He added - in his speech to Al-Jazeera Net - that the acceleration of the construction and construction processes in the afflicted states is what will make a difference in winning the votes of the voters in these states, whose people will not care much about any promises outside this framework, and therefore much focus will not be placed on previous achievements, according to Rizwan Oglu. .
The Turkish president signed the decree to hold the presidential elections on May 14 (Anatolia)
previous achievements
However, the Turkish businessman and writer Yusef Katabioglu believes that preoccupation with dealing with the repercussions of the earthquake does not mean that President Erdogan will not bet on his previous achievements.
He told Al-Jazeera Net, "Erdogan is betting on his achievements over the past 20 years while he is in power. His achievements are visible and directed to all the Turkish people, and no one can deny them, even his enemies."
According to Katebaoglu, Erdogan's achievements include the educational file, infrastructure, energy, defense industries, and space technology.
In terms of the external role that Turkey is now playing during Erdogan's era, the Turkish writer considered that the country "has become a major regional country and is present in every hot file, and this is due to Erdogan's global charisma and weight."
Kilicdaroglu bets
The opposition candidate and the head of the Republican People's Party, Kamal Kilicdaroglu, is also betting on the repercussions of the earthquake, but from the point of view of what opponents see as the government's delay and its slow response to the disaster.
The joint candidate of the opposition is also betting on uniting the opposition behind him with its diversity of tendencies, as well as what the opposition considers to be weaknesses of Erdogan and his party, especially the economic downturn that the country is witnessing recently.
repercussions of the earthquake
The leader of the Future Party (one of the six-party table) Alp Tekin Hocaoglu believes that "the earthquake showed the extent of the presidential system's inability to respond to emergency situations."
He explained to Al-Jazeera Net that the opposition program for the presidency is different in terms of concept from the program of the government coalition. According to Hocaoglu, the opposition proposes the concept of a joint presidential council that is not officially declared, in exchange for the concept of an individual administration that has all powers.
For his part, former Republican People's Party deputy Dursun Çişik confirms that the weaknesses in the response to the earthquake disaster constituted a "strength point" in favor of Kılıçdaroğlu.
Kurdish voices
Chichik believes, in a statement to Al-Jazeera Net, that Kilicdaroglu has the advantage that the six-party table, which named him a joint candidate, includes most of the opposition parties from various currents.
For his part, Hocaoglu says that the opposition is counting on repeating the Istanbul mayoralty scenario in 2019, when Akram Imamoglu won the run-off for the mayoralty, with a difference of 9% from the votes he won in the first round, as a result of the Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) failing to present a candidate for this position.
The opposition leader believes that if this party does not present its candidate for the presidency, Kilicdaroglu can win in the first round, describing the Peoples' Democratic Party in this regard as a "grabber's egg."
He pointed out that Erdogan's association with his nationalist allies such as Dogo Perincek and Dolt Bahceli caused discontent among two broad segments, the Kurds and the Alawites, whose total votes exceeded 30%.
While Kilicdaroglu is counting on including the votes of the Kurds and the rest of the left, according to writer and journalist Tahir Oglu, there are indications of the possibility of success in negotiations of this kind with the HDP, but it is uncertain whether it will continue in light of the opposition of the nationalists of the Good Party.
economic downturn
While the country has been witnessing a record wave of inflation for nearly two years, Hocaoglu, a leader in the Future Party, considered that "Turkish public opinion feels the economic decline, and the middle class has greatly diminished and the segment of the poor has increased," adding that "the economy will greatly affect the Turkish voter."
Writer Tahir Oglu expected the opposition to focus on the point where many of the promises and goals of 2023 have not been fulfilled, such as per capita income, reducing unemployment, inflation, and so on, although crises such as Corona and the Ukraine war contributed in some way to exacerbating the already existing economic crisis.