Turkey’s Kurds could sway Istanbul vote in local polls

ISTANBUL: Many of Turkey’s Kurds are set to put aside party loyalty and back Tayyip Erdogan’s major rival in Istanbul on Sunday, knocking the president’s hopes of winning back the city he once ran, according to pollsters.

Pro-kurdish DEM party voters were pivotal to Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu’s win in 2019 municipal elections, which shocked Erdogan and ended 25 years of rule by his AK Party (AKP) and its predecessors in Istanbul.

It also gave the opposition a critical foothold on power over the last five years.

But the opposition’s devastating defeat to Erdogan in last May’s presidential vote has changed the political landscape, leaving DEM voters split on how best to advance the cause of minority Kurdish rights.

In Istanbul, polls show Imamoglu of the Republican People’s Party (CHP) and his AKP challenger are neck-and-neck, with the DEM candidate trailing. This has let Kurdish party supporters with a dilemma; should they vote with their heart or their head?

“They are confused and undecided,” according to Yuksel Genc at pollster SAMER, who said 40% of DEM supporters had indicated they would vote for Imamoglu.

“They are considering voting for their party candidate but don’t want the AK Party to win.”

Erdogan’s government has cracked down on Kurdish parties since the 2015 collapse of a peace process to end a decades-old insurgency by the outlawed Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK).

DEM, parliament’s third largest party with around 10% of seats, is the successor of the HDP which faces potential closure in a trial over alleged militant ties that it denies.

It has been ravaged by thousands of arrests and the ousting of its mayors ater previous elections, feeding voters’ desire to hit the AKP nationwide while retaining DEM’S dominance in the mainly Kurdish southeast and its largest city, Diyarbakir.

“I think that in an environment like Diyarbakir, it is necessary to vote for DEM, but in Istanbul I would vote Ekrem Imamoglu,” said retiree

Mehmet Fatih Sutcu at Diyarbakir celebrations for the Kurdish spring festival.

Roj Girasun, director of Rawest Research, said DEM and the main opposition CHP had reached a deal over some areas of Istanbul, making it easier for DEM voters to support Imamoglu and with around half of them inclined to do so.

Erdogan, Istanbul mayor between 1994-1998, has slammed this as a “dirty bargain,” seeking to stoke tensions between the parties.

DEM’S Istanbul mayoral candidate Meral Danis Bestas has dismissed the idea of tactical voting.

“Our call is for people to vote for us,” she said in an interview.