Why Mediterranean tensions may not benefit Erdogan at home
An equitable resolution to the crisis with Greece and France would be great for Turkey, but even that may not help the Turkish president’s approval ratings.
Is Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan using tensions in the Mediterranean to boost his domestic approval and win the yet-unannounced-but-constantly-rumored snap elections? Many of his opponents think so.
In his “A Look at the Week” show with Rusen Cakir on the independent news platform Medyascope on Aug. 28, the journalist Kemal Can underlined an interesting point: Turkey’s recent military operations in Syria boost Erdogan's approval ratings. The various crises in Syria prove that while a similar crisis in the eastern Mediterranean may boost Erdogan’s approvals, the effect will be short-lived. Erdogan’s attempts to use nationalist rhetoric to undermine his domestic opponents call into question the true aims of his foreign policy moves.
Indeed, several Turkish sources who spoke to Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity warned that Turkey’s ongoing conflict with Greece and France in the Mediterranean, along with the announcement of the discovery of large gas reserves under the Black Sea and the decision to turn the Hagia Sophia into a mosque, may be mere ploys to raise Erdogan’s likeability with religious and nationalist voters.
Allegedly, Erdogan wants to boost his approvals — reported to have fallen below 30% earlier this year — so he can call for snap elections. The far-fetched plan presumes that Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu would quit his post to run against Erdogan. (Under Turkish law, public servants — be they appointed or elected — must quit their positions when they run for public office.) Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) holds a majority in the Istanbul municipal council, so the city councilmen would elect an Erdogan ally as mayor until the next local elections in 2024. That would allow the AKP to recapture a major source of municipal income for its electoral base.
