Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan suffered a heavy defeat in local elections in Turkey. His Justice and Development Party, which has ruled Turkey continuously since 2002, lost first place to the opposition for the first time in 20 years.
Instead, the main winner was Turkish democracy, which demonstrated how different the country is from Russia or Belarus despite Erdogan's accusations of authoritarianism.
The election was called a symbol of the change of eras, a serious bid of the social-democratic opposition, the so-called Kemalists – supporters of the ideas of the secular republic and its founder Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, to win the 2028 general elections.
However, there is no reason to talk about the change of era itself, as long as the current president remains in power and his party controls the parliament. Although Erdogan said the day before that this election was his last, meaning he hinted that he had no intention of running in 2028, things could change in the future.
According to the results of the elections, the opposition candidates not only retained control over the country's three largest cities – Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir, but also won in several provincial centers previously headed by pro-government mayors. In particular, in Bursa, the country's fourth most populous city.
The victory in Istanbul was of particular importance, since it is the economic capital of the country, Erdogan started his career here and was the mayor for several years.
In general, the opposition Republican People's Party received the support of 37.7% of voters - 8% more than the 2019 result. Erdogan's party won 35.5% of the vote - 7% less. Erdogan's nationalist MHP allies also suffered losses.
The third result of Fatih Erbakan's Islamist New Prosperity Party (6%) was a surprise. He is the son of the Islamist leader Necmettin Erbakan, the Prime Minister of Turkey in 1996-1997, who is considered to be Erdogan's political mentor.
Fatih Erbakan is an LGBT activist and a well-known anti-vaccine activist.
"I was not vaccinated. I don't plan to get vaccinated. mRNA (vaccine. - ed.) means penetration into the nucleus of a human cell. You can make these people give birth to half-man-half-monkeys. This can lead to the birth of creatures with 3 ears and 5 eyes," he told the press in 2021.
The reasons for Erdogan's defeat
Ukrainian journalist Osman Pashayev, who has been covering Turkish politics for many years, attributes the high result of the opposition to the fact that the majority of young voters, who participate in the elections for the first time, vote for the opposition.
"Even in conservative families, young people want more freedoms than Erdogan's conservative discourse offers. An Ipsos study previously suggested that this trend would give more votes to liberal, pro-Western forces. The composition of the electorate and its aspirations are gradually changing."
PHOTO AUTHOR, GETTY Photo caption Despite the defeat, Erdogan still has enough leverage and popularity for revenge
Pashayev reminds that Erdogan won the 2023 elections thanks to the support of the province, the poorer Anatolian regions.
However, in the local elections of 2024, the social democratic ideas of the Republican People's Party won in some of these regions as well.
There is still a lot of time before the 2028 elections and it is too early to talk about the end of the Erdogan era, observers say.
On the eve of the 2023 elections, some experts also predicted a defeat for Erdogan, pointing out that rising inflation and the cost of living, the fall in the Turkish lira and the catastrophic consequences of the February 2023 earthquake will undermine his popularity.
For some time, the representative of the opposition even led in the polls. However, this did not prevent Erdogan from being re-elected with a margin of only 4%, and together with the nationalists from obtaining a comfortable majority in the parliament. The opposition bloc then disintegrated.
So the key questions for now remain whether Erdogan will end his political career in 2028, and if so, who will succeed him.
"Erdogan's party itself has his cult of personality, and this is a problem, there are no people No. 2, No. 3, and the decision to whom he will leave this party depends only on him," says Pashaev.
PHOTO BY GETTY Image caption Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu is a potential opposition presidential candidate in 2028
Erdogan's son-in-law Selçuk Bayraktar, co-owner of the company that produces the famous Bayraktar drones, is named among the potential successors. And also the current Minister of Foreign Affairs Hakan Fidan, who headed the national intelligence in 2010-2023.
It is not yet known who will represent the opposition in the 2028 elections. Among the potential candidates are Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu and Ankara Mayor Mansur Yavash.
But the main result of the election is that despite the aura of an autocrat, which has been attached to Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey has demonstrated that it is a democracy with a highly competitive environment where the opposition can achieve victory through elections.
"Turkey has shown itself to be a democracy and nullified all comparisons with Russia. Finally, the West saw it," says Osman Pashaev.
