Turkey’s ruling party to discuss call for early vote
Future ally of AK Party proposes to bring forward election to August
ANKARA (Reuters) – Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ruling party will discuss the possibility of holding Turkey’s presidential election in August, more than a year earlier than planned, the government spokesman said on Wednesday, following a suggestion from its nationalist allies.
The government had repeatedly dismissed the prospect of an early election. Erdogan, the president, last year narrowly won a referendum to change the constitution and create an executive presidency. However, those extended powers are not due to take effect until after presidential polls, now slated for November 2019.
“The party’s official institutions will make an evaluation and a statement will be made afterward,” Deputy Prime Minister Bekir Bozdag, the government’s spokesman, said.
The leader of the small MHP nationalist party, currently in opposition but expected to form an alliance with Erdogan’s AK Party in parliamentary polls, also slated for November 2019, had said it would be difficult for the country to “endure current circumstances” until then. He pointed to risks to Turkey including the economy and possible increases in migration into the country.
Erdogan said he would meet MHP leader Devlet Bahceli on Wednesday. Erdogan also said that the constitutional change would be fully implemented with the November 2019 elections – possibly hinting that early polls were not on the cards.
Following Bahceli’s comments, Turkey’s lira weakened to 4.1103 per dollar by 12:41 p.m., from 4.0865. The Borsa Istanbul main stock exchange index fell more than 2%.
Some investors have been factoring in the prospect of early elections, citing the difficulty of the government keeping the economy going at its current breakneck pace – it expanded at 7.3% in the fourth quarter – until late next year.
“It is going to be increasingly difficult to sustain the currently high growth rates until November 2019, when presidential/parliamentary elections are scheduled,” Eurasia Group’s Naz Masraff said in a note to clients this week.
“Early elections are, therefore, likely later this year (60% likelihood) before the economy takes a turn for worse.”
Erdogan, an economic populist and a self-described “enemy of interest rates,” wants to see cheaper bank loans and more credit growth to fund big construction projects and boost the economy ahead of elections.
He has lashed out at international investors over a selloff in the lira, which has hit a series of record lows and is down some 7% this year. Economists say the decline reflects entrenched wage growth and inflation, and interest rates must rise to arrest its fall.
“Turkey has a government that has failed domestically and internationally,” Bulent Tezcan, the spokesman for the main opposition CHP party, said in response to Bahceli’s call. “Serious economic troubles have come to our doorstep. The fire of the exchange rates won’t die.”