The political union of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and departing Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu was a marriage of convenience. Davutoglu knew this when Erdogan handpicked him to succeed him as head of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) and thus the premiership of Turkey. The current outgoing prime minister had been brought to prominence thanks to former President Abdullah Gul, who became the first person Davutoglu disappointed. Accepting the nomination to be prime minister, Davutoglu expressed his gratitude to “party elders” but failed to mention Gul. He failed Gul's loyalty test, and then he failed Erdogan’s.
On May 18, a day before Binali Yildirim was put forward to replace Davutoglu as prime minister, Tarhan Erdem, a respected analyst of domestic politics, interpreted the unfolding events as the advent of one-man rule in Turkey, alluding to arbitrary rule by Erdogan. Tracing its path, he said it began with the elections held on June 12, 2011, and laid out its three stages: preparation for one-man rule, transition to one-man rule and the advent of one-man rule.