Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had everything on his side to win the May 14 elections, the most difficult since he took control of Turkey 20 years ago. However, just as an earthquake raised it to the top in 2002, another can bring it down in 2023.
For the first time, Erdogan has two rivals who can beat him in the second round. The mayor of Istanbul, Ekrem Imamoglu is the most dangerous. The polls favor him. They also do it with the mayor of Ankara, Mansur Yavas.
The economy is the president's Achilles curtain. Inflation is out of control. It reached 85% last November and this year's average will be around 42.5%. GDP, according to Reuters, will not grow more than 3%, two points below the government's forecasts.
Erdogan has lowered rates to favor production and consumption, but the lira plummets and the central bank runs out of foreign currency to meet the debt. Erdogan is saved by employment, which continues to be robust, but wages do not grow at the pace of prices.
The president compensates for this imbalance with populist measures: he raises the minimum wage, pays off the debts of five million savers, anticipates retirement for two million more people, and promises hundreds of thousands of public housing. He will give the victims of the earthquake 10,000 lire, almost 500 euros.
The Treasury does not have the resources for so many donations, but this is now the least of it. It matters to win at all costs.
Erdogan is rising in the polls, but none of this may be enough. Having placed himself at the top of the pyramid, he has no choice but to face the shortcomings of his management. He is father and state. He has no escape.
Who will the Turks blame for the death of more than 20,000 people?
Turkey is not a state of law. There is no independent public opinion or justice. Prisons are full of dissidents since the failed 2016 coup. Expressing your own opinion is dangerous.
Erdogan is an authoritarian populist. He gets along better with Russian President Vladimir Putin than with American Joe Biden. He maintains better relations with the dictatorships of the Middle East than with the European Union. The old western vocation of Turkey has been replaced by a new type of Ottomanism.
The Turks applaud the president's chauvinism, his opposition to Sweden and Finland joining NATO, the alliance to which Turkey contributes the largest land army.
Europe has ignored him for decades and Erdogan has learned to turn his back on it. He would rather be the head of a mouse than the tail of a lion. He wants to play a decisive role in the relations of the West with the Middle East and Central Asia, also with Russia.
The Turkish president maintains good relations with the Kremlin. Five years ago he bought the S-400 missile system from Russia despite warnings from the US, which ended up sanctioning him.
A NATO country should not buy Russian weapons, but Erdogan wants to swim between two waters. He is a pragmatist. He weathered the downpour of US sanctions while still talking to Putin. Thanks to this communication channel, he managed to get Ukraine to export the cereals that feed half the world. Likewise, he has provided him with the drones that have been so effective against the Russian troops.
To Europe's relief, it took in 3.6 million Syrian refugees in 2015, a generosity that has paid off in spades. Thanks to these displaced, Erdogan has been able to put pressure on the EU, especially Greece. The refugees would have continued on to the heart of Europe if Brussels had not footed part of the bill.
This ambivalence is useful for his political ambitions, but it also shows that Erdogan is unprincipled. For years he supported the Muslim Brotherhood, the brotherhood of political Islam with a presence in all Arab countries, especially Egypt. He also supported the Islamic State in Syria and antagonized Arab countries, especially the Gulf monarchies.
Now, however, it has done a 180-degree turn. It is again reaching out to all these countries, including Syria, and has received Prince Mohamed Bin Salman, the same man who, according to all indications, ordered the assassination of dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. Saudi Arabia, in return, made a donation of 5,000 million euros to the battered Turkish Treasury.
Erdogan's populist measures have a price and the worst thing for him is that it is not enough to retain power.
Imamoglu is a very serious threat. So much so that he wants to imprison him. Last December he managed to get himself sentenced to two years in jail for "insulting" the Central Electoral Board. In case the appeals that he has presented to the Supreme Court are delayed beyond May 14, the Ministry of the Interior is preparing two more accusations, one for support of terrorism, which could end his political career.
It's funny how history repeats itself. Thanks to the earthquake that devastated Izmir in 1999, Erdogan came to power in 2002. The state's response was then very deficient and the destruction of the tremor caused a financial crisis that plunged the popular classes into misery. Erdogan's rivals managed to jail him, but to no avail. The Turkish people knew very well who could pull it off. The impoverished clung to the pious Erdogan.
Now, the president tries the same thing with Imamoglu: jail and discredit. The polls, however, suggest that he could win in the second round.
The Turks lose faith in the father who has guided them for two decades. The economic ballast is too great. The earthquake can be the finishing touch.
Many modern buildings have collapsed that should have been built according to official standards to resist the movements of tectonic plates. That they have fallen alongside older, surviving buildings is evidence of the corruption lining the pockets of local authorities.
Erdogan has tolerated the corruption of his acolytes. If the opposition wins, he and his clan could be prosecuted. There is too much at stake to allow fair elections.
Imamoglu, who tours the country from rally to rally, promises a return to parliamentarism. He is willing to reduce the powers of the presidency that Erdogan made almost universal in 2017.
The president blames Western powers for Turkey's economic hardships.
After surviving a 2016 coup, he blamed the United States for instigating it and has never forgiven the European Union for not backing him from the start. The repression was brutal and the institutions, especially the Justice, lost all independence.
Imamoglu has no hope. The Supreme Court will ratify the prison sentence.
The same thing happened to Erdogan. He won the mayoralty of Istanbul in 1994 at the head of an Islamist party, but went to jail four years later, accused of reciting a religious poem that questioned the secularism of the republic. This prison gave him the necessary legitimacy to win the 2002 elections.
Imamoglu can also take advantage of the repression of which he is a victim. He is a member of the main opposition party, the People's Democratic Party, a former ally of Erdogan. Party leader Kemal Kilicdoroglu posted a video on social media this week attacking Erdogan for failing to rescue earthquake victims. It has been viewed more than 16 million times.
Kilicdoroglu wants to be the opposition candidate in the May 14 presidential election. He leads an unprecedented coalition in the fragmented Turkish electoral map. Six parties that a month ago agreed to a roadmap. The only thing they lack is a candidate, but it is not easy to appoint one because they will be an immediate target of the state apparatus.
Kilicdoroglu thinks it's his time, but the polls favor the younger and more dynamic Imamoglu.
Erdogan will have a hard time until spring. It can no longer guarantee the well-being of the most popular classes as it has up to now. The earthquake has devastated many provinces that are hostile to it, such as Hatay. The three months of state of emergency in ten of them will prevent a normal campaign. Opposition rallies will most likely not be able to take place.
The media, at the service of the state, will silence Imomoglu and his supporters.
It is very possible that before May 14, justice will also outlaw the Kurdish and left-wing Popular Democratic Party, third in the 2018 elections with almost six million votes. Its leader, Selahatin Demirtas, has been in prison since 2016.
Erdogan will undermine democracy to maintain power. He hopes that history will place him even higher than Kemal Ataturk, father of modern Turkey.
It is possible that, if the earthquake sinks their options, it will provoke a crisis with the West.
It can launch an offensive against US-allied Kurds in northern Syria or facilitate a flood of Syrian refugees on Greek shores. The EU and the US will need a lot of composure to face these provocations.
Turkey looks to the West. She has tried for years to get the EU to admit her, but France and Germany have prevented it. This slamming of the door has encouraged Ottoman nationalism and Erdogan's Islamism. Many Turks have applauded him for 20 years and continue to do so.
It is not fair that Europe chooses Istanbul but disregards Diyarbakir. Similarly, it is not easy for Turkey to aspire to be a member of the European community without giving up its Central Asian identity.
The European priority to maintain a Christian identity – Turkey would have been the most populous country in the Union with about 85 million inhabitants, the vast majority Muslims – has radicalized Erdogan, the former mayor of Istanbul, one of the main European cities.
Everything happens for some previous cause. Earthquakes are unpredictable and so is now the result of the Turkish presidential elections on May 14.
