Erdogan receives support from Turkey's third presidential candidate
Turkey faces the second round of the presidential elections this Sunday with a bitter taste in its mouth. What analysts and political experts had predicted as a clear defeat for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan ended up leaving a narrow victory for the incumbent. So small was the gap in the results that the 64 million Turks eligible to vote will go to the polls again on 28 May to discern who will hold office in the next legislature. And all indications are that Erdogan's 20 years in power may not be over.
If the May 14 elections already left a victory, albeit a minimal one, for the still highest representative of Ottoman politics, the recent declaration of the third candidate supporting Erodgan seems to tilt the balance even further towards the Justice and Development Party (AKP). Sinan Ogan has appeared before the media to announce that "I announce that we will support candidate Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and I invite the voters who voted for us in the first round to vote for Mr Erdogan". He does so "after deliberation and because we believe it is the right thing to do for our country and our people".
Ogan received just over 5% of the vote in the first round, and there was some doubt about which candidate he would support in the second round. Indeed, there has been a major division within the party between those who, as the leader has done, want to support Erodgan, and those who advocate a Kemal Kilicdaroglu government. What they all agree on is that there are four key issues that the new government must address urgently: the refugee crisis, the "threat to national security", the economic problems "caused by internal and external dynamics that have caused deep problems in public opinion", and the fight against terrorism in Turkey.
Sinan Ogan's party believes that its voters will back this support: "Our electorate is very close to us, of course when we need them, they will come with us", Ogan said in an interview with CNN. The communication of support for Recep Tayyip Erdogan has received a rapid response from the latter. The first thing he wanted to make clear is that the announcement is not linked to any kind of agreement or negotiation between the parties, but that "Sinan knows very well our clear position in the fight against terrorism and the survival of the homeland, especially regarding relations with the Turkic world", the president told TRT Haber television.
What is clear is that the figure of Ogan, a barely known ultra-nationalist of Azeri origin who was expelled from the MHP (Nationalist Action Party), has become vital for Turkey's future. The disappointment of Kilicdaroglu's National Alliance "in convincing us about the future" and in the decision to "fight relentlessly against racism", as Sinan Ogan explained, has finally convinced the party to back the man who will almost certainly win again in a new election. The Turkish opposition's inability - once again - to stand up to Erdogan, coupled with the support of the candidate who, less than a fortnight ago, won almost three million votes, is pushing for a new era of Erdoganism in Turkey.