Turkey's historic election could move up as Erdogan calculates
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is seeking a favorable vote schedule as he fights to extend his 20-year rule.
ISTANBUL — Election fever has gripped Turkey as it enters its centennial year and statements by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan Thursday renewed frenzied calculations over the possibility of presidential and parliamentary polls being held sooner than expected.
The country’s 62.4 million-strong electorate is currently expected to head to the polling booths on June 18 in probably the biggest elections in recent Turkish history. At stake is whether voters decide to extend Erdogan’s authoritarian rule into a third decade or select the opposition’s yet-undetermined candidate.
Discussion over the prospect of early elections — a regular feature of Turkey’s election cycle — has extra significance this year, largely due to difficult economic circumstances.
The worsening economy led many to predict last summer that Erdogan was facing a perilous election landscape as runaway inflation — sparked largely by his own insistence on bringing down interest rates — led to a cost-of-living crisis.
