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municipalities. Although various AKP figures have disputed the results, Erdogan is likely to eventually accept the electoral outcome, seeking at least to benefit from an improvement in international perception regarding the democratic process in Turkey.
“The election result reflects voter discontent over rampant inflation and rising unemployment following Turkey's currency crisis in late 2018. With more than four years until the next round of elections, the government is now likely to prioritise structural reforms over populist policies.”
Turkey’s electoral chiefs issue interim decision to uphold Istanbul election result. Turkey’s Supreme Electoral Council (YSK) on April 24 issued an interim decision to uphold the March 31 Istanbul municipal election result that President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ruling AKP party narrowly lost to the opposition. The AKP has argued to the YSK that around 15,000 people fired from state jobs in a crackdown launched following the July 2016 coup attempt against Erdogan should not have been eligible to vote in the Istanbul election. However, the electoral board rejected that reasoning. It did, however, agree to investigate the AKP’s claims that more than 41,000 ineligible voters and election officials participated in the vote. If the election is annulled, some observers will conclude that Turkey’s democratic foundations have been fatally undermined.
Albayrak talks of “no scheduled elections”. Finance minister Berat Albayrak on April 17 even referred to there being no scheduled elections ahead in Turkey as he tried to talk up confidence in the Turkish economy. “We’ve come out of a difficult period with a minimum amount of damage,” he said. “We’ll take whatever steps necessary to meet our targets because there are no elections ahead of us. We will take those steps with great ease.” In the elections, the capital Ankara and cities along the Mediterranean coast slipped from the grasp of Erdogan’s populist-nationalist alliance, which largely stood its ground across much of the country’s rural interior.
Both Erdogan and the AKP have been dealt an embarrassing symbolic blow by the loss of Istanbul and Ankara—and five of the six largest Turkish cities in all—in the polls , which many recession-hit Turks used to protest at the perceived economic failure of the executive presidency.
The AKP appealed the initial results in all 39 districts of Istanbu l, a city of 15mn people, leading to partial or full recounts across the business capital. “I understand the feeling of defeat of the people who demanded a recount,” Imamoglu said on April 7. “You managed this city for 25 years. It is not easy, you lost. But democracy is like that—democracy is not a one-way path.”
Erdogan’s trolls, who enjoyed their finest hour with the overthrowing of PM Ahmet Davutoglu in May 2016, have been orchestrating a massive campaign to overturn the local election results, while there is speculation that some factions of the AKP and Erdogan’s governing coalition are contemplating accepting the poll outcome. While the president’s courtiers dwell on the best way forward, media loyal to Erdogan have gone so far as to claim that coup-plotters supported by some external powers and a clutch of terrorist organisations are angling to take over the AKP’s municipalities rather than accepting that the public no longer deems them capable of achieving any such thing, meaning their machinations have little effect on public opinion.
“Markets seem[ed] content AKP lost”. “Markets seem ‘content’ with the line that the AKP lost Ankara and Istanbul, but has accepted the result, and that this affirms Turkey's democratic credentials. I think a successful challenge to these results would reverse this positive spin, and would un-nerve markets. It would I guess also risk instability domestically, with claim and counterclaim from both sides....better for the country just to move on now from these elections....,” Ash observed on April 3.
12 TURKEY Country Report May 2019 www.intellinews.com