Some fringe parties are busy playing political games – like calling on the opposition to “plan the transition period” together – in order to join the Nation Alliance. Meanwhile, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) chairperson, continues to campaign for the opposition bloc’s endorsement. Despite originally saying that the opposition did not dispute President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s candidacy, he walked back on those comments, claiming that Erdoğan could only seek reelection in the event of an early election. Kılıçdaroğlu then posed a challenge, urging Erdoğan to run so that he, Kılıçdaroğlu, could “send him away” on election day.
The CHP chairperson also said that he would not pay his electricity bill until the government agreed to reverse a recent price hike. Some of his supporters in the media, unsurprisingly, sang the praises of Kılıçdaroğlu’s move, one calling it “An act of civil disobedience reminiscent of (Mahatma) Gandhi.” Since the government already announced that it would take steps to shelter low-income households from price hikes, the main opposition leader’s campaign against paying electricity bills happens to contradict his traditional argument that he “knows the state.” Kılıçdaroğlu's attempts to create a “fault line” in Turkey, which significantly subsidizes energy, against the backdrop of a global trend is reminiscent of past actions by the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP). Indeed, that boycott represents a brand of politics designed to undermine the public administration – a form of radical, provocative politics that the main opposition party copied from the HDP, which protested said price hikes on the streets.
Blending the CHP’s irresponsibility, caused by the many years spent not in a position of power, and the HDP’s marginal nature is a recipe for disaster. Ahead of the 2023 election, the CHP-led opposition could make a seriously negative impact on Turkish democracy by attempting to create a fault line over economic hardship. Understandably, some cannot help but wonder how the CHP’s Kemalist-Turkish nationalism and the HDP’s pan-Kurdish position could move closer together. What immediately comes to mind is “the radicalism of left politics” – a page out of the CHP's Istanbul provincial chair Canan Kaftancıoğlu’s playbook.
The CHP-HDP rapprochement, however, isn’t limited to just that. The main opposition party’s Kemalist positivists and the HDP’s pan-Kurdists are also united by their Jacobinism and secular anger. The most recent manifestation of that common ground is seen in the similarities between a CHP minority whip's reference to "the medieval mindset" and an HDP parliamentarian's comments on “500 years of Ottoman reactionism and 1,500 years of Islamic reactionism.” Their thinking remains dominated by the same distinction, or rather, clash, between progressives and reactionaries.
That further undermines Kılıçdaroğlu’s already unimpressive discourse of “making amends.” Let us recall that the Kemalists have traditionally viewed the Anatolian people as an “ignorant and backward” group that needs to be “civilized.” That specific Jacobin genome, which forms part of the CHP’s DNA, remains the same. Meanwhile, HDP politicians subscribe to a left-wing, secularist and Jacobin brand of politics in the name of “liberating” the Kurds. To make matters worse, they refuse to distance themselves from the PKK terrorist organization.
Kılıçdaroğlu’s current political style can be described as multi-dimensional, careful and a combination of select elements. The group of consultants behind him put together three distinct items, albeit with varying levels of consistency, that he deploys in his discourse and action. Namely, the concepts borrowed from former Justice and Development Party (AK Party) politicians, such as “making amends” and “inclusion”; the actions inspired by the HDP and radical left, such as boycotts, threatening to take to the streets and propaganda rooted in lies; and, lastly, the Jacobin and revanchist feelings that the CHP elite cannot seem to keep under control – which manifest themselves in threats to the bureaucracy and pledges to hold people accountable.
My sense is that Kılıçdaroğlu’s inconsistent and eclectic brand of politics may be enough to clinch the presidential nomination. However, it won’t persuade enough voters to help him win the race.
