Religious identity issues have come to the fore of Turkish politics again amid moves by the opposition and the government to court voters beyond their traditional grassroots ahead of crucial elections next year.

In a surprise move last week, main opposition leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu proposed a legal safeguard for the freedom of female public servants to wear the Islamic headscarf, seeking to allay concerns among the pious that his secularist Republican People’s Party (CHP) might reinstate a ban abolished a decade ago if it comes to power next year. In a matter of days, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced a plan to create a public institution to run and help fund cemevis — the houses of worship of Turkey’s sizable Alevi community, which represents a distinct and often ostracized branch in Islam. The body will be attached to the Culture and Tourism Ministry, and Alevi religious leaders will be entitled to public salaries, he said.

Though Erdogan presented the plan as a “major democratization reform,” many Alevi groups saw it as an attempt to place cemevis under government control or woo Alevis for his re-election bid next year. 

Alevi suspicions of Erdogan’s intentions stem mostly from the controversial remarks he and members of his Justice and Development Party (AKP) have made about Alevism over the years. The community complains that young Alevis have been routinely shut out of public employment under the AKP.