“Due to the economic crisis and the reduction of purchasing power by more than 1/4 during the last two years, this percentage seems to be unapproachable”, estimates a columnist of the German newspaper.
She is also in the pre-election phase Turkey. Within the next ten months, presidential and parliamentary elections must be held, but there are many controversial procedural and constitutional issues, as Rainer Herrmann, a columnist for Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.
The danger for the Turkish president is that the AKP party may lose the absolute majority of 52.6%, which it has with the crutches of the nationalist MIR movement.
“Due to the economic crisis and the reduction of purchasing power by more than 1/4 during the last two years, this percentage seems to be unapproachable”, the columnist estimates. But there is a primary question. Can Erdogan run for another term?
Opposition and electoral law
“Article 101 of the Constitution stipulates that the term of office of the President lasts five years and that a person may be elected President of the Republic no more than twice” the newspaper recalls. “Erdogan has already been elected president twice by the people, first in August 2014 and then in June 2018. Now he would be running for a third time. The opposition has not faced it yet, because it does not want to be accused of using legal means to defeat Erdoğan, since he cannot achieve this goal politically. In case the Supreme Electoral Council (YSK) as the sole and final authority accepts Erdoğan’s candidacy, there would be no chance to challenge it anyway. But then, as opposition parties make clear, the shadow of disputed legitimacy would hang over his next term.The AKP party justifies a third candidacy, which Erdogan has yet to officially announce, with the fact that the Constitution was changed in 2017 and the transition to a presidential system was completed. The lawyers argue that the new Constitution was not passed in 2017 and only articles have been changed. The disputed article 1 01 remained unchanged”.
The German journalist also refers to date of the electionwhich should be done no later than June 24, 2023.
“There are many indications that Erdogan or the parliament will not hold the election before mid-April. Because on April 15, 2023, the new election law will come into force that reduces the chances of the opposition. The old election law allowed many parties to form a coalition and then share the seats among themselves. Under the new electoral law, each party must stand separately and is therefore subject to the 7% threshold it must muster to send MPs to Parliament. In this case many voters would not be able to be represented in the Parliament, because four of the six opposition parties that have formed an alliance gather less than 7%. Despite the big programmatic differences in some areas, they are united by the common goal of ending the Erdogan era.” .
DW / Irini Anastasopoulou
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