Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, who belongs to the opposition Republican People's Party (CHP), was sentenced by the court on December 14 to two years and seven months in prison and deprived of his political rights for three years Previously accused Turkey's top electoral authorities of being "idiots".
As elections loom in June 2023, there is yet another smell of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's political crackdown.
Currently, Turkey's inflation rate is as high as 84%, and its currency, the Lira, has plummeted 80% against the US dollar in the past five years.
Although the economy is still growing to a certain extent, Erdogan's policy of cutting interest rates to deal with inflation over the years has caused the Turkish economy to develop distortedly. The central bank spent a lot of foreign exchange and currency swaps with local banks to support the exchange rate of the lira. Unable to make long-term plans, price signals are useless, and the cost of high inflation falls even more heavily on ordinary people who have no way to obtain value-preserving assets. In May of this year, a poll showed that 36% of the people cannot afford basic living expenses.
Material conditions are often the root of spiritual conditions.
According to polls conducted from the end of August to the end of November, as many as 60% of respondents believe that the country is heading in the wrong direction, and 67% believe that the economy is the most important issue.
Under such circumstances, Erdogan's election situation is extremely unfavorable. Almost any one-on-one confrontation with any potential opposition opponent shows an obvious defeat.
The mayor of Istanbul, Imamoglu, who has indicated that he will not run for president, leads Erdogan by more than 10 percentage points in the polls of the final election; the opposition group of six parties also slightly leads Erdogan in the polls The Justice and Development Party (AKP) and its right-wing allies.
In order to reverse the election situation, Erdogan has already made two-handed preparations.
After Imamoglu was sentenced, a large number of people gathered outside the mayor's palace to express their support.
(Reuters)
Justice cracks down on opposition
On the one hand, since the military coup failed in 2016, Erdogan has used it as an excuse to cleanse most dissidents in Turkey's public sector, making public power largely under his control.
According to Reuters statistics as of March 2020, more than 150,000 people have been dismissed or suspended from various departments including the interior, education, police force, military, and judiciary.
Among them, the judiciary has generally been replaced by "newcomers". At least 45% of Turkish judges and prosecutors have less than 3 years of experience.
With the judiciary largely under control, the legal process has become more politically colored.
The background to the insult crime that got Imamoglu jailed this time is that Imamoglu narrowly defeated Erdogan's hand-picked opponent in the 2019 Istanbul mayoral election and sat on the seat. The post of mayor that Erdogan held before he came to power was ultimately disputed by the Justice and Development Party by the Supreme Election Commission (composed of senior judges) to cancel the election results and announce re-election. Defeat opponents by double-digit percentages.
It was against this background that Imamoglu scolded the "idiot" that got him jailed this time.
Although Imamoglu can still appeal and will not go to jail immediately, his judicial troubles can be foreseen to come one after another.
Erdogan met with US President Joe Biden on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Indonesia.
(Reuters)
Imamoglu's conviction is not a single instance of Erdogan's judicial crackdown on political opponents.
Earlier this year, Canan Kaftancıoğlu, the head of the CHP's Istanbul branch, was sentenced to nearly five years in prison for insulting the president, among other charges.
Erdogan’s pressure on Kurdish politicians is particularly severe. Currently, 108 members of the People’s Democratic Party (HDP) are facing charges of terrorism for instigating protests against Erdogan’s government in 2014 for obstructing the fight against ISIS; In this case, the People's Democratic Party, which has been equated by Erdogan with the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which is also considered a terrorist organization by the European Union and the United States, is also likely to be banned from politics by the court next January.
The electoral stakes of the 'Kurds'
On the other hand, the security threat of the Kurds is also increasingly on Erdogan's political agenda.
Since the outbreak of the Russo-Ukrainian war, Erdogan has advocated crossing the border into Syria again to attack the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) who are working together with Europe and the United States to deal with ISIS, claiming to establish a 30-kilometer-long security zone.
The purpose of this move is first to weaken the Kurdish armed forces, and second, to let the Chinese see that the 3.6 million Syrian refugees in Turkey may have a day to return home.
The move has not been agreed or acquiesced by Russia and Iran, which are on opposite sides of Turkey in Syria, for months.
However, after Turkey accused the PKK of being responsible for the terrorist attack in Istanbul on November 13, the Erdogan authorities launched missile attacks on Kurdish forces in northern Syria and Iraq. start".
On November 13, an explosion occurred on Istiklal Avenue in Istanbul, Turkey, and a large number of police officers and ambulancemen rushed to the scene.
(Emrah Gurel/AP)
The Kurdish issue has at least three benefits for Erdogan.
One: The increased importance of security issues will help reduce the public's attention to economic difficulties.
Moreover, if Turkey and Syrian Kurdish armed forces really go to war before the election, Erdogan will have a reason to declare a state of emergency, which may postpone the election, or use this to suppress voting in Kurdish areas in Turkey to increase the odds of winning.
Second: Although the six opposition parties dominated by the Republican People's Party are slightly ahead of Erdogan's forces in polls, objectively speaking, the opposition (excluding the Kurdish-dominated People's Democratic Party) The Kurds may become the "kingmakers" in the 2023 election. In the 2018 general election, the People's Democratic Party won about 12% of the vote. .
Since the opposition parties have a variety of ideologies from secularists, nationalists, and Islamists, they have been worried that the secret communication with the Kurds will cause nationalist supporters in the faction to flow back to the Justice and Development Party and its allies .
Erdogan hyping up the Kurdish threat and dealing with the Kurds in a high-profile way can make it harder for the two sides to cooperate secretly, and it can also put the opposition in a position where they don't know whether to continue to oppose Erdogan or support their Syrians on nationalist grounds. Difficult situation to enter.
Third: Amidst Turkey's economic difficulties, one of the main reasons for the opposition to criticize Erdogan is that it has reached an agreement with the European Union to accommodate 3.6 million Syrian refugees. deport Syrian refugees.
Using the Kurdish issue to open up the Syrian front, Erdogan will be able to regain the voice of anti-refugee sentiment from the opposition and let voters see that he is doing something for the repatriation of refugees.
As the election in June 2023 is approaching, Erdogan, who has been in power for 20 years, is expected to take many actions in order to reverse the lagging election situation, and Turkey's domestic and foreign turmoil will continue to come.
The mayor of Istanbul, Turkey, was sentenced to 2 years and 7 months in prison, which may affect the chances of running for the presidential election.
Turkish media: Turkish military will launch ground operations in Syria as soon as possible