The French media are wary to negative about his prevalence Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the Turkish presidential elections.

Tayyip Erdogan now has until 2028 to reshape Turkey as he sees fit, building a republic he envisions as “more religious, more authoritarian and more oriented towards the Gulf, Russia and China”. This is pointed out by the French newspaper Le Monde, referring to the second round of the presidential elections in Turkey, noting that “after twenty years in power, nothing seems to be able to wrinkle his gift. Neither his unbridled authoritarianism (200,000 judicial investigations have been launched for insulting the president) nor the inflation (44% on average per year) which is hitting the population hard.”

His re-election for a third term confirms the status of him as the ‘unsinkable president’ who has mastered the art of recovery, notes the French newspaper, underlining that “in twenty years, we have seen him overcome everything: political crises, mass protests, corruption scandals, military coup attempts and the abandonment of his former companions”.

According to the French newspaper, Erdogan is “a populist leader with strong authoritarian roots, who in his twenty years of reign has significantly strengthened his control over the country.”

“This power is political and psychological as well as material, if we consider the fact that 15 million people – out of a total population of 85 million – live solely on social assistance distributed by the Justice and Development Party (AKP), the “state party”, a superstructure that plays with servitude and client relationships,” comments the French newspaper.

For its part, the Journal de Dimanche points out that despite the numerous criticisms for the state of the economy, but also for the management of the earthquake that hit Turkey in February, Erdogan continues to embody a factor of “stability” in Turkey.

Jean Markou, professor at the University of Grenoble and researcher at the French Institute of Oriental Studies in Istanbul, points out in the newspaper the persistence of the Turkish president, during his election campaign, in “the greatness of Turkey”, citing as an argument the country’s diplomatic role “in the context of the war in Ukraine, where his mediation efforts between Kiev and Moscow have allowed him to once again be at the center of the diplomatic game. The same newspaper also refers to Erdogan’s son-in-law, Selcuk Bayraktar, describing him as “the face of the Turkish establishment and beyond”, who “ended up gaining the status of a national hero” and could be promoted to high office or run for office. for the mayorship of Istanbul.

Analyst Jean-Dominique Mercet also refers to the possible effects on France’s relations with Turkey in his article in the Opinion newspaper, underlining that French President Emmanuel Macron wants to warm up his relations with Erdogan, but also that Turkey, which is becoming more and more nationalistic, he is one difficult but inevitable partner for France.

Such as mentioned, Macron and Erdogan they could meet on Thursday, June 1, on the occasion of the meeting of the new European Political Community in Chisinau, Moldova, and they will also meet again at the NATO summit on July 11 and 12 in Vilnius, Lithuania. According to the French newspaper, instead of an Islamist, the re-elected Erdogan will be more than ever a nationalist, since, as it says, he does not have a supranational vision of a community of believers, which would exceed the interests of Turkey, nor is he a pure ideologue, even if he has firm beliefs. Finally, Liberation newspaper in its article entitled “Erdogan forever”, underlines that the Turkish leader is a mixture of nationalism and religious fundamentalism, underlining the opposition’s inability to compete with him and the disappointment of a large part of the Turkish population after the final results.