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ISTANBUL: A retired civil servant who few outside Turkey have heard of has pushed President Recep Tayyip Erdogan into a run-off election – the first in the country’s post-Ottoman history.
It was a bittersweet result that left Kamal KilicdarogluHezbollah supporters are frustrated after a heated night of vote counting in Turkey’s most important election in modern times.
Almost complete results are shown Erdogan He won 49 percent of the vote and the secular opposition leader got about 45 percent.
Pre-election polls have shown Kilicdaroglu on course to break the 50 percent threshold needed for a complete victory.
The lira fell against the euro as investors were disappointed that Erdogan’s era of the unconventional economy was far from over.
But it still marked a historic achievement for the 74-year-old leader of the most powerful opposition coalition to take on the man who never lost a national vote during his two-decade rule.
Kilicdaroglu claimed his party’s stats show it is leading and urged supporters to guard the polls while the final ballots are counted.
“Don’t be afraid of the will of the nation,” he told election officials in Turkey early Monday.
The May 28 runoff will give Kilicdaroglu a chance to overturn a dismal electoral record that saw him lose his 2009 bid for Istanbul mayoralty and then six national votes to Erdogan and his Islamist-rooted party.
This record was nearly broken by the six-party opposition alliance when it announced its intention to challenge Erdogan.
The anti-Erdogan coalition agreed to support his candidacy after arguing over it for a year. They rallied around him after the result of the first round.
“We are winning,” Kilicdaroglu’s ally Meral Aksner wrote on Twitter as the result became clear.
– Without ambitions – Softly spoken, Kilicdaroglu is a study in contrasts with the brash and explosive Erdogan – a populist whose campaign talent helped him become Turkey’s longest-serving leader.
His silver dress and square glasses give Kilicdaroglu a professional vibe that betrays his background as an accountant, who worked his way up to head Turkey’s Social Security Agency.
The campaign has seen him ignore Erdogan’s personal attacks and instead highlight the hardships all Turks have endured over years of political and economic turmoil.
One of his main pledges is to hand over many of the powers that Erdogan has accumulated in the last decade of his rule to parliament.
Then he promises to leave office and make way for a younger generation of leaders who have joined his multifaceted team.
“I am not a person with ambitions,” he said before the vote.
His dream was to “restore democracy” and then “sit in the corner and play with my grandchildren.”
KITCHEN TALKS Kilicdaroglu’s support for Kilicdaroglu helped in large part from a cost-of-living crisis that analysts – and many Turkish voters – pinned on Erdogan’s unorthodox economic beliefs.
But it is backed by a viral social media campaign that bypasses state control of television by speaking to voters in snapshots recorded from his tiled kitchen.
These live chats have millions of views and tend to address topics that rarely appear in pro-government media.
One of the most famous scenes is Kilicdaroglu breaking taboos by talking about being an Alevi.
The group has targeted decades of violent repression because it follows a more spiritual Islamic tradition that separates it from both Sunni and Shia Muslims.
Erdogan once accused the Alevis of creating a “new religion”.
“God gave me my life,” Kilicdaroglu said in the video. “I am not a sinner.”
The late-night post had nearly 50 million views on Twitter the next morning.
– Steely edge Some of his other politics have a steely edge that evokes the nationalism of Türkiye’s founder Mustafa Kamal Ataturk – the first and most important leader of the Republican People’s Party (CHP).
Kilicdaroglu has pledged to repatriate nearly four million Syrians who have fled the civil war within two years.
He said the issue was not about “race” but about “resources” in Turkey during its economic crisis.
Kilicdaroglu reaffirms this message by recalling his humble upbringing in the Alevi Kurdish province of Tunceli.
He once said, “We didn’t have a refrigerator, or a washing machine, or a dishwasher.”
Later, he invited reporters to his pitch-black apartment to discuss his decision to stop paying his electric bills.
It was a clever campaign statement of solidarity with inflation-hit voters in Turkey that tried to bridge political divisions.
“This is my struggle to claim your rights,” he said next to an old lamp shining brightly on his desk.
It was a bittersweet result that left Kamal KilicdarogluHezbollah supporters are frustrated after a heated night of vote counting in Turkey’s most important election in modern times.
Almost complete results are shown Erdogan He won 49 percent of the vote and the secular opposition leader got about 45 percent.
Pre-election polls have shown Kilicdaroglu on course to break the 50 percent threshold needed for a complete victory.
The lira fell against the euro as investors were disappointed that Erdogan’s era of the unconventional economy was far from over.
But it still marked a historic achievement for the 74-year-old leader of the most powerful opposition coalition to take on the man who never lost a national vote during his two-decade rule.
Kilicdaroglu claimed his party’s stats show it is leading and urged supporters to guard the polls while the final ballots are counted.
“Don’t be afraid of the will of the nation,” he told election officials in Turkey early Monday.
The May 28 runoff will give Kilicdaroglu a chance to overturn a dismal electoral record that saw him lose his 2009 bid for Istanbul mayoralty and then six national votes to Erdogan and his Islamist-rooted party.
This record was nearly broken by the six-party opposition alliance when it announced its intention to challenge Erdogan.
The anti-Erdogan coalition agreed to support his candidacy after arguing over it for a year. They rallied around him after the result of the first round.
“We are winning,” Kilicdaroglu’s ally Meral Aksner wrote on Twitter as the result became clear.
– Without ambitions – Softly spoken, Kilicdaroglu is a study in contrasts with the brash and explosive Erdogan – a populist whose campaign talent helped him become Turkey’s longest-serving leader.
His silver dress and square glasses give Kilicdaroglu a professional vibe that betrays his background as an accountant, who worked his way up to head Turkey’s Social Security Agency.
The campaign has seen him ignore Erdogan’s personal attacks and instead highlight the hardships all Turks have endured over years of political and economic turmoil.
One of his main pledges is to hand over many of the powers that Erdogan has accumulated in the last decade of his rule to parliament.
Then he promises to leave office and make way for a younger generation of leaders who have joined his multifaceted team.
“I am not a person with ambitions,” he said before the vote.
His dream was to “restore democracy” and then “sit in the corner and play with my grandchildren.”
KITCHEN TALKS Kilicdaroglu’s support for Kilicdaroglu helped in large part from a cost-of-living crisis that analysts – and many Turkish voters – pinned on Erdogan’s unorthodox economic beliefs.
But it is backed by a viral social media campaign that bypasses state control of television by speaking to voters in snapshots recorded from his tiled kitchen.
These live chats have millions of views and tend to address topics that rarely appear in pro-government media.
One of the most famous scenes is Kilicdaroglu breaking taboos by talking about being an Alevi.
The group has targeted decades of violent repression because it follows a more spiritual Islamic tradition that separates it from both Sunni and Shia Muslims.
Erdogan once accused the Alevis of creating a “new religion”.
“God gave me my life,” Kilicdaroglu said in the video. “I am not a sinner.”
The late-night post had nearly 50 million views on Twitter the next morning.
– Steely edge Some of his other politics have a steely edge that evokes the nationalism of Türkiye’s founder Mustafa Kamal Ataturk – the first and most important leader of the Republican People’s Party (CHP).
Kilicdaroglu has pledged to repatriate nearly four million Syrians who have fled the civil war within two years.
He said the issue was not about “race” but about “resources” in Turkey during its economic crisis.
Kilicdaroglu reaffirms this message by recalling his humble upbringing in the Alevi Kurdish province of Tunceli.
He once said, “We didn’t have a refrigerator, or a washing machine, or a dishwasher.”
Later, he invited reporters to his pitch-black apartment to discuss his decision to stop paying his electric bills.
It was a clever campaign statement of solidarity with inflation-hit voters in Turkey that tried to bridge political divisions.
“This is my struggle to claim your rights,” he said next to an old lamp shining brightly on his desk.
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