Erdogan’s onion mountain – Moskovskaya Pravda

The silence of the victims of the catastrophic earthquake will be a heavy burden on the precinct commissions when counting votes for candidates for the presidency of Turkey. The elements took the lives of a colossal part of the country’s population and, as it turned out, guaranteed transparency and security of ballot boxes from fraud. Ballots from the names of the dead, who in reality will never say their political sympathies, will be dropped into the narrow slots of the boxes without hindrance.

– In areas of seismic disaster, a huge amount of civilian documents are hidden under the ruins. Falling into the wrong hands, they can be used for dirty electoral technologies. It is necessary to prevent third parties who look like the dead or the survivors from voting for them, insists Ahu Sun, secretary general of the non-governmental organization Oy ve Ötesi, an NGO called Oy ve Ötesi, in an interview with the Oxygen newspaper Oksijen.

The Turkish authorities rule out this possibility and maintain that the civilian data of those who died from the earthquake are not included in the electoral catalogue. However, official statements only reinforce the topical scarecrow.

“I don’t have the slightest doubt what color the urns are,” Recep Tayyip Erdogan said in mid-April.

The president expected to attract additional votes with a bright watercolor allegory, but he received the suspicions of the opposition, which immediately began after his statement to verify information about unregistered victims. Officially, 50,000 people died as a result of the disaster on February 6th. But residents of 11 regions and most rescuers claim that the number of victims actually far exceeds the declared one. The lack of practical conditions for the voting of the remaining living millions of citizens who left their homes and moved to the western part of Turkey reinforces public doubts. It has not yet been decided how such a mass of disadvantaged people will be able to exercise their right to choose.

Therefore, it is not surprising that a growing prejudice of non-virtual, otherworldly participation in elections is rapidly seizing an adult, as is commonly believed, a reasonable social group of people with the right to vote, with some kind of non-childish fear. A closer look at the ongoing electoral process makes it clear that the emerging horror films are sophisticated electoral technologies of a motley opposition. She simply has nothing to oppose to a highly experienced politician – the current president.

“Erdogan does not hide a “hare in a hat,” writes Mehmet Gilmaz, editor of the Oxygen newspaper, Oksijen. – He does not have in his head the idea of ​​pursuing a classical electoral strategy, which is traditionally based on the main pre-election thesis of overcoming poverty. Realizing the impracticability of this slogan, he will try to gain time by entering the second round, which will not be attended by those who did not elect him in the first, and perhaps this will be enough to win.

However, from other analytical reports, somewhat different conclusions follow. According to one source close to the government, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who heads the Justice and Development Party, will receive 40%, while his opponent Kemal Kılıçdaroglu, the Republican People’s Party, will receive 60% of the vote. In the event of Erdogan’s actual defeat, the opposition will inherit massive seismic damage, skyrocketing prices, an unbalanced economy, huge budget deficits, devastated central bank funds, and possibly Turkey’s difficult exit from the International Monetary Fund. In addition, the new president will have to fulfill the promise of the former president to provide housing for earthquake victims within a year, otherwise we should expect an increase in public discontent. It is unlikely that the fragmented opposition into six camps will have the strength to do this in the coming years. By shifting the heavy burden of unresolved problems onto her shoulders, Erdogan compensates for the possible costs of his social rating from defeat in the elections.

Therefore, we can assume that the strategist Erdogan does not really hope for a quick victory, but in the long term he is preparing the groundwork for success in the elections in 2028. To maintain sympathy and relieve public tension, the president plays a performance – a televised address to the nation that onions are tastier than astronomically expensive gastronomic meat. A joking tone should brighten up a possible farewell to the ellipsis: 21 years of power is not the final term for a master of the art of high political aerobatics. This is confirmed by the past 6 years since the day of the popular vote, which changed the form of government in the state and gave Erdogan full power, when parliamentary democracy became presidential. The results of her actions are encountered at every corner. For example, it is known that subtropical onions are sweeter than Russian black earth onions and do not cause tears. Pensioners are crying, and not only them, in endless lines for cheap bread and meat, standing for a long time at the glass doors of stores with social discounts. Not everyone can afford to buy a kilogram of meat for 400 Turkish liras.

The departure of the president is staged overseas. In the pre-election scenario, two main plots are played out at once, in the USA and Turkey. According to Turkish, the country’s future will be determined by the second round of presidential elections, which will be contested by both leading candidates, who received almost equal results at the first stage, approximately 50 + 1% each. The transatlantic story contains rearmament prospects – the US Department responsible for the export of military equipment and equipment has suddenly given the green light to deliveries to Turkey worth a total of $ 259 billion for the modernization of Turkish F-16s and other purposes. If the approval is received in the US Congress, it will become significant and a turning point in recent years. Ankara is also preparing to moor at Turkish piers in addition to German submarines, English, but already with nuclear equipment. There is no doubt that the President of Turkey is elected under these programs.

For the West, Erdogan is not so good, too independent. Recently, in spite of the global financial hegemon, he launched the first stage of a giant business center in Istanbul, which has been under construction since 2013, in spite of the global financial hegemon. Under its roof are banks and companies with thousands of employees, a luxury hotel, a shopping center and much more. At a ceremonial speech, he said that in the context of growing economic contradictions between Asia and Europe, we are opening a new window of opportunity to establish geopolitical influence, tying a sovereign Turkish financial and economic knot here.

Under the Istanbul bridge between Asia and Europe, waves of historical territorial issues are still churning. The old geopolitical themes about revising the parameters of the maritime zone bordering Greece sounded. The opposing sides in the elections united under the militant Janissary banner, taking out from the medieval pantry a marching cauldron with a capacity of several regiments – for centuries huge cauldrons were used by the advanced Ottoman troops for boiling and as army banners leading into battle – for cooking countless revanchist slogans in it. Erdogan took a creative approach to historical heritage, promising to give every Turkish citizen 25 cubic meters of natural gas produced in disputed maritime zones.

Europe is silent, knowing about the real horrors if the Dardanelles gates open and the resettlement to the West of the dispossessed by the elements and the endless mass of refugees from all over the Asian continent begins. The silence of the West determines the nature of the behavior of Turkish politicians. Back in early April, on the city’s earthquake ruins, Defense Minister Hulusi Akar assured his Greek colleague, who delivered humanitarian aid, with speeches about peace in the Mediterranean and Aegean seas, invoking the spirit of alliance for the benefit of both sides. And now, at the end of the month, he, not at all embarrassed, accepts at a rally the oath of a crowd of thousands to die for the restoration of imperial Ottomanism.

The Metropoll center reveals a paradox: Erdogan comes second behind Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu in the presidential election, but his party may retain a superior lead over the opposition. The end result will determine the number of voters who will concentrate the two main party opponents. In order to make independent decisions, the Turkish parliament needs support from 301 seats out of 600. Less than a month left before the opening of polling stations, Erdogan hastened to make a statement that he always believed in the farsightedness, wisdom and vision of the people and, fortunately, did not disappointed, sincerely hopes for his correct choice on May 14th.

Photo freestockcenter / Freepik