Turkish opposition parties have been trying to contend with Türkiye's ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) for nearly 20 years. Usually, there is a wave of excitement before an election as the opposition parties believe they will win, but this passion never evolves into a strategy.

I think there are important reasons why the opposition has been unable to turn its passion for winning and anger toward the government into an election strategy. Firstly, opposition parties spent about four years singing like the cricket in La Fontaine’s fable while the ant worked hard. Secondly, the opposition underestimated the capacity developed by the AK Party government, the People's Alliance, the state of Türkiye and President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

Today, from a rational point of view, Türkiye is expanding its impact through foreign policy. The country gradually increases by the day its regional political and economic influence in Western Europe, Africa and Asia. And the AK Party is the locomotive behind Türkiye's new and developing capacity, with 20 years of experience.

Leadership capacity

Above all, President Erdoğan personally has developed a higher capacity than the AK Party and the government. And this ability the president has developed is visible all over the world. When President Erdoğan enters negotiations on any global issue, he adopts a result-oriented stance in favor of reaching a comprise. Whenever he stepped in on issues, whether it be in Syria, the Ukraine-Russia war or the grain crisis, even if they were considered the biggest unsolvable global problems, hope for a solution always arose.

The leadership capacity that Erdoğan has developed, although not so desired, is highly respected by the West. Opposition parties have been underestimating this growing capacity but have had problems building their own. The main reason the strategies of the opposition parties are becoming more desperate day by day is that they fail to correctly comprehend the state of Türkiye.

The second important reason is that the opposition parties misread the expectations of the Turkish people due to their ideological prejudices, developing an irrational attitude that did not lead to political results. And the third reason is that they have been practicing politics without content, without developing a plan for the most elementary of political components such as the economy, international relations and legal affairs that will carry this opposition group to power.

Hopes for ‘table for six’ fading

During the last six months, the government has developed solutions in response to the individual preferences and requests of voters one after the other, while the opposition displayed its inability to pull itself together. The opposition failed to use its chance, and the successive moves and announcements of the government swayed the masses. So Turkish citizens are turning their direction back to President Erdoğan and the People's Alliance rather than the opposition. Therefore, it would not be wrong to call the strategies of the opposition "desperate."

Keeping all these considerations in mind, when we look at the results of the public opinion polls from the last four or five months, society did give the Republican People's Party (CHP) a chance. But the "table for six" could not present an appropriate profile or develop a credible policy, and the hopes for the "table of six" started to fade away. As a result of these waning hopes, support for the People's Alliance began to increase.

If the political atmosphere continues like this for a few more months, the AK Party and the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) will likely receive as many votes as they did in the previous election. Meanwhile, the opposition, scattered across some 20 parties, will probably get as many votes as the last election. Therefore, based on polling data, one can say things are not going very well for the opposition.