Türkiye, Erdogan trembles from the elections: Kilicdaroglu can defeat him

There is only a week left until the presidential and parliamentary elections in Turkey, a country suffering from a serious economic crisis as well as the earthquake that killed more than 50 thousand people on February 6 and caused the displacement of more than 5.9 million in the southern provinces. in northern Syria. An election that will see President Recep Tayyip Erdogan face an unprecedented challenge, while support continues to grow for his first challenger, opposition leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu who leads the Republican People’s Party (CHP) and a center-left six-party coalition.

On May 14, polls predict a record voter turnout, which could mean the end of Erdogan’s twenty-year government. Instead, the provinces affected by the earthquake three months ago, most of which were strongholds of Erdogan and his party, will not vote. Supreme Election Board (YESK) Chairman Ahmet Yener has already announced that at least 1 million voters in the earthquake-affected areas will not be able to vote due to their displacement. But if Kilicdaroglu does indeed win the election, some analysts believe Erdogan may not hand over power to him so easily.

In Türkiye, elections are held every five years. Candidates for the presidency can be nominated by parties that crossed the threshold of 5 percent of the electorate in the last parliamentary election or by those who have collected at least 100,000 signatures in support of their candidacy. The candidate who receives more than 50 percent of the vote in the first round is elected president, and if this does not happen, a run-off is held between the two who received more preferences. Parliamentary elections are held at the same time as the presidential elections. Turkey follows a system of proportional representation in parliament, where the number of seats won by a party in the 600-seat legislature is directly proportional to the votes it receives.