Alliances, aims and justifications along the road to the local elections

The road to the local elections reverberates with a debate over both the AKP-MHP and CHP-İYİ (Good) Party alliances.

MHP Leader Devlet Bahçeli is trying to fill the “void” left by President Tayyip Erdoğan, who has by means of his G20 and Latin America trips placed the problems in the “People’s Alliance” into the “cooler.” Prioritizing “Turkey’s survival” and the justifications for the “People’s Alliance,” Bahçeli does not shy from “cossetting” Erdoğan, either, by making praise-filled references as he grabs the opportunity to portray himself as the “architect of the intended alliance” in the local election, just as in the “People’s Alliance.” Bahçeli, on the one hand thus reinforcing his justification for the “alliance” with recourse to the justifications for the “People’s Alliance,” has on the other hand also assumed a position that “regulates” reactions in both parties to the alliance. It would not, in fact, be far from the mark to say that Bahçeli was aiming with this demeanour to strengthen his hand in his scheduled meeting with Erdoğan following the latter’s Latin American trip. On the other hand, even if disquiet over the MHP-AKP alliance in the local election appears to have been quelled by Erdoğan, there is now open talk in the media of an accelerated splintering into such groups as the Bilalites (Supporters of Bilal Edoğan - Tayyip Erdoğan's son), Beratites (Supporters of Berat Aybayrak - Treasury Minister and Tayyip Erdoğan's son-in-law) , Soyluites (Supporters of Süleyman Soylu - Minister of Interior) and Davutoğluites (Supporters of Ahmet Davutoğlu - Ex-Prime Minister) within the party and also of serious jostling among these cliques to secure places in local authorities for their own devotees. And, bearing in mind that the cause of the indecision over Parliamentary Speaker Binali Yıldırım standing as the AKP’s Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality mayoral candidate was Berat Albayrak’s “tampering with the lists” in Istanbul sub-provinces, this shows that the feud between cliques within the AKP has descended to the sub-provincial level and claims of “inter-clique feuding” that have made their way into the press are not without foundation.

ONE PLUS ONE DOES NOT EASILY EQUAL TWO IN THE CHP-GOOD PARTY ALLIANCE!

As to developments on the Nation Alliance front, there is even less clarity.

With discussions still ongoing over the provinces in which there might be an alliance, the CHP declares that it will announce its candidates in 600 more provinces and sub-provinces on 6 December.

On the other hand, while CHP General Chair Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu more openly says, “The business is proceeding well,” Good Party General Chair Meral Akşener does so with duplicitous insinuations. However, leading Good Party lights are visibly stating through various mediums that they lack great enthusiasm for this alliance and that some of them in fact “oppose by way of principle” a CHP-Good Party alliance.

Even if it can be said that a good deal of these objections aim to strengthen the Good Party’s hand in negotiations, it is true to the same extent that there is a side to them that speaks on behalf of a powerful ultranationalist vein within the Good Party that has no taste for an alliance with the CHP.

However, for the CHP and Kılıçdaroğlu’s calculations in İstanbul, Adana, Mersin, Hatay, Antep, and even Ankara to work out, securing the support of the HDP in one way or another appears to be necessary, because it is highly debatable how much sway both the Good Party and the CHP will hold over their own bases in the provinces where an alliance is made. For, just as there will be a large segment in the Good Party base that will not vote for the CHP even if there is an alliance, it is beyond dispute that there is a significant segment in the CHP base that will be unable to stomach voting for a party like the Good Party in which the ultranationalist tradition is influential.

In other words, it is not easy to make one plus one equals two in the alliance between the Good Party and the CHP. Making one plus one equals two is for sure equally difficult in the AKP-MHP alliance.

Both parties’ administrators undoubtedly know this. But they prefer to ignore it.

CAN THE AKP-MHP ALLIANCE BE DEFEATED IF THE HDP IS EXCLUDED?

The sole realistic way under the prevailing conditions to enable the CHP to surmount this handicap entails the CHP engaging in joint electoral cooperation with the HDP and progressive democratic forces. However, the CHP is wrecking this opportunity from the very outset by nominating its candidates from the top down. Moreover, the CHP is carefully steering clear of an open electoral alliance with the HDP, because the pressure from the nationalist climate the “People’s Alliance” has engendered and the reaction of the nationalist vein within the CHP act as a brake on such HDP-CHP cooperation. And this also shows that the CHP positioning itself on the Kurdish problem and Kurds in a way that baulks at even standing by the full extent of its mere verbal pronouncements will be decisive in the local elections, too.

So, can the CHP make an alliance with the HDP through indirect means?

Even if, looking at local initiatives, the appearance is given that steps are being taken in this direction, the effect of such initiatives will be exceptionally limited. And, the CHP is presumably placing its trust in Kurdish voters’ intuition-based “electoral solidarity.” However, the extent that this will come to pass is highly debatable given the realities of the country and politics.

Under such conditions, democratic forces will most certainly insist on an electoral struggle in the local elections around a joint local electoral platform aimed at preventing the local elections from becoming a support for the construction of a “single-party, single-man regime.”

Translated from Turkish by Tim Drayton