Erdogan may lose, but no one will kick out Russian tourists

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Who opposes Erdogan?

The situation before the elections in Turkey, in its tension and intrigue, can only be compared with the Ukrainian elections of 2019. Then the confrontation was between Vladimir Zelensky, Petro Poroshenko and Yulia Tymoshenko. It was believed that literally every one of these candidates had a chance at the presidency, at least if it came to the second round.

In Turkey, the main candidates are not three, but two: incumbent President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the head of the country's largest and oldest opposition force, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu. His last name is difficult to pronounce even for the Turks, so they themselves prefer to call him simply Kemal Bey. "Bey" in Turkish means "master"; This is a respectful form of address for any man.

Before the election, it was difficult to predict that Kılıçdaroğlu would become the main opposition candidate. He is an age-old politician, he is 74 years old - five years older than Erdogan. Kılıçdaroğlu struggled for power all his life, but never reached its peak. Even in the last elections, in 2018, the Republican People's Party (CHP in Turkish) nominated not Kemal Bey, but Muharrem Ince, a younger politician, against Erdogan. He came in second with 30.64%.

Another candidate was also being prepared for participation in the current elections - the mayor of Istanbul, Ekrem Imamoglu. His election victory in 2019 proved that he would clearly suit a wide variety of political circles and at the national level. But literally at the beginning of this year, the court sentenced him for insulting a representative of the authorities - almost three years in prison. While the appeal is going on (and in Turkey they can take months and years), Imamoglu is at large and could run. But relying on him is a huge risk, because theoretically the authorities can put pressure on the court, enforce the verdict, and then the opposition will be left without a candidate.

There was another option - the mayor of Ankara Mansour Yavash. He is also from CHP and also won in 2019. But he is a nationalist and suspicious of Kurdish participation in political life, and to win elections in Turkey, you have to be able to please them, because Kurds make up more than 20% of the population.

Theoretically, Meral Aksener, the leader of the Good Party, could nominate her candidacy. It would be spectacular - a woman president in Turkey. But she is also a nationalist and understands her own repulsive background: she was the head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs in the 1990s, when the Turkish authorities waged a particularly tough fight against Kurdish radicals.

After that, Meral Aksener was a member of the Nationalist Movement Party (the well-known far-right organization "Gray Wolves" - their most radical wing) and left it only because it got too close to Erdogan. By the way, the "Good Party" is called so only because the Turkish word for "good" - İYİ - is graphically very similar to the generic sign of one of the oldest Turkic tribes. It is as if some of the Russian parties depicted Perun on their logo.

After torturous disputes, the Turkish opposition from six parties made a choice in favor of Kemal Bey. Yes, he is middle-aged and rather fed up with even the supporters of his own party. Nevertheless, he is a real oppositionist. Criticizing the authorities, he speaks of the incompetence of Erdogan himself, and not of some abstract officials or oligarchs.

Can the opposition really win?

Various polls predict Erdogan and Kılıçdaroğlu have roughly equal chances of winning. There are many sociological services in Turkey and, accordingly, there are many disputes about their objectivity. Some truths play along with the authorities, some with the opposition. But in general they show a very small gap.

Now Kemal Bey claims that he can win in the first round. Theoretically, this is possible, as is Erdogan's victory in the first round. But it seems much more likely that the opponents will reach the second round.

In addition to them, two more candidates are participating in the elections. The first is Sinan Ogan. He speaks Russian, defended his dissertation at MGIMO, studied the politics of Russia and Ukraine, and spoke at the events of Putin's Valdai discussion club. But his rating is within the statistical error, 2-3%. The second is Muharrem Ince, who, as mentioned above, was the CHP candidate in 2018. The opposition bloc persuaded him to support Kemal Bey for the common good. But he refused and ran his own campaign without any chance of success, with a rating of about 5%. Even these percentages, drawn by outsiders, can prevent one of the race leaders from winning right away.

On May 11, Muharrem Ince announced that he was withdrawing from the presidential race . But his name will still be on the ballot, which means that he will still gain at least tenths of a percent. In the current conditions, even they can become decisive.

If Erdogan loses, will he just give up power and leave?

This is a very difficult question, but here we need to go beyond the post-Soviet logic that we are accustomed to. Türkiye under Erdogan is not Russia under Putin or Belarus under Lukashenka. Of course, the President of Turkey is capable of "dirty play", but still keeps within some limits.

Suffice it to recall the election of the mayor of Istanbul in 2019. The candidate for this post was Binali Yildirim, the former prime minister of the country, a man very close to Erdogan. When he lost to opposition candidate Ekrem Imamoglu, Erdogan annulled the results of the elections, held them again, and the oppositionist showed an even better result . And his victory was acknowledged.

This says a lot about the work of various state structures - primarily the CEC. But it is also worth noting the strong traditions of Turkish parliamentarism. Yes, Erdogan severely curtailed the powers of the parliament in 2017 by adopting a new constitution through a referendum , but he did not take away the main thing from the deputies - the ability to publicly criticize the authorities. Even taking into account the fact that 339 out of 600 seats are occupied by deputies from the ruling coalition, the oppositionists are playing their own game.

Obviously, if new parties appeared in the Russian or Kazakh parliament (for example, Nechaev's New People), then this happened at the go-ahead from the presidential administration. But Meral Aksener's "Good Party" became parliamentary, clearly against the will of the authorities. In 2018, they wanted to ban it from participating in the elections due to registration deadlines (it is impossible to create a party right before the elections), but the already existing CHP faction went to the trick and asked 15 of its deputies to temporarily join the Good Party. This was enough to form a faction, and parties that have a faction can participate in elections without preconditions. It is simply impossible to imagine something similar in Russia.

Yes, there are political prisoners in Turkey, especially after the events of 2016, which the authorities call an attempted military coup.

What happened in 2016?

The events of the night of July 15-16, 2016 are a turning point in the history of modern Turkey, after which Erdogan consolidated his power. Then tanks appeared on the streets of Istanbul and Ankara, and combat aircraft appeared in the sky above them. According to the official version, it was an attempted military coup by supporters of Fethullah Gülen , an Islamic preacher living in the United States. Although there were reports that night that Recep Tayyip Erdogan had fled abroad, he went on air from his phone and called for resistance. 251 supporters of the authorities were killed in clashes with the military.

Fethullah Gülen condemned the violence and denied ordering the armed overthrow of the Turkish government. Some experts note inconsistencies in the official version and hint that the coup attempt could have been staged.

in the country and even beyond its borders began After the coup attempt , real political purges - the military, politicians and journalists allegedly involved in the conspiracy were tried. Even graduates of the network of lyceums created at one time by Gülen were under threat (he was called the “Turkish Soros” for his ability to use “soft power”). However, the main consequence of the events of 2016 was the constitutional referendum in 2017. Like the current elections, it was very tense, but Erdogan managed to strengthen his power by a small margin - Turkey became a presidential country, not a parliamentary one. It is this decision that Kemal Kılıçdaroglu now wants to win back.

But Turkey did not yet have its own Bolotnaya Square, there was no “May 6 case”, there is no analogue of the Minsk detention center on Akrestsin Street, where peaceful protesters were beaten to the point of blood. Erdogan's tools are right-wing populism, manipulation of the information agenda, but not yet fear.

In response to this, one can argue that until now his power has not yet been under such a threat. Whether he decides to cross the line, cancel the election results and then fire on the inevitable protests will depend on a variety of circumstances. We do not know anything about the real mood in the ranks of the Turkish police, especially in large cities, and the army. Yes, there is no doubt that Interior Minister Suleiman Soylu is loyal to Erdogan, but does this extend to his subordinates? In addition, do not forget about the international reaction. It is clear that Russia, Azerbaijan and the countries of Central Asia, the Muslims of the Balkans (Albania, Bosnia and Kosovo), as well as China and the countries of the Persian Gulf, will not condemn Erdogan for cruelty. But Turkey's entire economic model is to serve as a bridge between Asia and Europe. But the European Union is definitely not interested in getting a second Lukashenka at its borders.

So far, Erdogan promises to leave the post in case of defeat. By the way, it is possible that, having taken the position of an oppositionist, he will be able to successfully spoil the life of his opponents in parliament. Moreover, they want to return the previous edition of the Constitution, when Turkey was a parliamentary republic.

And the opposition candidate is for democracy?

Kemal Bey became a presidential candidate as a result of difficult negotiations within the opposition. This is very important: it is difficult to describe how different political forces have united against Erdogan, creating a bloc with the informal name "Table of Six". It's about as if Alexei Navalny sat down at a table with a group of deputies from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation and A Just Russia, as well as Grigory Yavlinsky and Igor Strelkov - and they would try to write a common political program.

Moreover, if Kemal Bey becomes president, he will have seven vice-presidents at once. These are the leaders of each of the Table of Six parties (except for the CHP, because its leader is Kemal Bey himself), as well as the opposition mayors of Istanbul and Ankara. It seems that no one has yet invented a political construction of a similar complexity, and we will see how it will work in practice only after the fact.

In addition, Kemal Bey declares that his goal of coming to power is to destroy the entire existing system and change the Constitution. And there, most likely, new, already more honest elections will be required.

That is, the correct answer to the question of what Turkey will be like under Kemal Kılıçdaroglu is “nobody knows this.” Most likely, the new president will not be independent, because he will have to consult with the "politburo" of the vice presidents and overcome a lot of obstacles. It will not work to deceive the allies and start his own one-man rule, because Kemal Bey himself understands that without their support he would not be a presidential candidate, but a pensioner.

Before the already mentioned Ukrainian elections in 2019, Poroshenko’s headquarters hung mocking billboards in Kiev with the inscription “Last Chance for Grandma” and an obviously unsuccessful photo of Yulia Tymoshenko, betraying her age. This is also relevant for the Turkish oppositionist, but he can still realize this “last chance”.

How does the opposition feel about Putin? Will her victory hurt relations with Russia?

In short, the new government will most likely engage in foreign policy according to the residual principle and relying on the medical commandment “do no harm”.

You can read more about what Russia can expect from the victory of the opposition in my article for the Carnegie Endowment . Something has changed since the article was published: Turkish analyst Hakan Aksai, who is close to the opposition, came to Moscow and gave an interview to Fyodor Lukyanov. The latter can often be seen as a moderator when Putin speaks at Valdai, and he is also the editor-in-chief of the influential magazine Russia in Global Affairs, associated with the Russian Foreign Ministry. The Turkish guest did everything to convince the Russian expert community that the opposition would not harm relations between Moscow and Ankara. In support of his words, he presented a letter written by Kemal Bey himself for Russian political circles.

However, it seems that all these efforts have come to naught. On the evening of May 11, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu posted tweets in Turkish and Russian. The Russian version reads: “Dear Russian friends, You are behind the montages, conspiracies, Deep Fake content and recordings that were exposed yesterday in this country. If you want to continue our friendship after May 15, keep your hands off the Turkish state. We continue to stand for cooperation and friendship.”

At first, it was not clear what exactly was being discussed: no shocking videos with the participation of the oppositionist appeared in recent days, although there are plenty of possible stories: Erdogan, for example, stated that Kılıçdaroğlu belongs to LGBT.

Most likely, he meant a cheaply and clumsily made video , in which one of the commanders of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (recognized as a terrorist organization in Turkey) Murat Karayilan speaks in support of the oppositionist. This video looks more like a joke than a malicious fake, but at a meeting with youth, Erdogan cited it as evidence of Kilicdaroglu's links with terrorists.

What does the Russian intervention have to do with it, however, remains a mystery: anyone can edit such a video. The Kremlin's playing along with Erdogan is undeniable, but it is played out in more serious ways: for example, the Kremlin recently granted Turkey a gas payment deferral .

Moscow is clearly embarrassed by some other recent statements by Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu. In interviews with Deutsche Welle, ARD and The Wall Street Journal, he said that he was ready to "turn Turkish foreign policy 180 degrees", "return to Western civilization" and comply with obligations to NATO . But if he decides to fulfill these promises after the victory, he will be bound hand and foot with all sorts of obligations. For example, the introduction of anti-Russian sanctions will inevitably deal a crushing blow to the Turkish economy, which is tightly tied to the Russian market. By the way, the rise in price of the most common products is perhaps the main topic of the current election campaign, and even Kemal Bey himself shot one of the latest videos in the kitchen, where he sorts out packages from the supermarket and is horrified at how prices have risen.

Nevertheless, there is a certain threat to Russia in the victory of the opposition. This is the fate of the Akkuyu NPP, which is being built by Rosatom. The coalition program contains a promise to revise the conditions for the implementation of the project, and the Turks are not worried about the threat of an accident, but rather about possible corruption schemes.

If the opposition wins, what will happen to the relocators and tourists?

Among the promises of the Turkish opposition is a ban or at least a restriction on the sale of real estate to foreigners. Kemal Bey himself spoke about this, as well as his colleague in the coalition Meral Akshener. The logic here is simple: after the devastating earthquake, many Turkish citizens are in need of housing, and foreigners are believed to be to blame for unwanted price increases. This is, of course, dangerous, nationalist rhetoric.

However, there are not so many Russian relocators who planned to acquire Turkish real estate: this is already a sign of full-fledged immigration and rooting in the country. Moreover, the Russians have never been in a hurry to buy apartments in the regions on the border with Syria, which were especially affected by the earthquake. Most likely, resort regions like Antalya and Marmaris will be affected to a lesser extent, because the Turkish economy will need foreign investment under any government. It is unlikely that tourism from Russia, which brings huge profits, will also suffer.

Most likely, Turkey will remain the main country through which Russians will travel to European countries.