Caroline Baudry (special envoy to Turkey) / Photo credit: Serkan Avci / ANADOLU AGENCY / Anadolu Agency via AFP
This Sunday is the second round of the presidential election in Turkey and outgoing President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan seems to be the favorite, despite the polls in favor of his opponent. On the side of Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu’s supporters, the time has come for resignation. Europe 1 went to meet them, on the Galata Bridge, in Istanbul.
In Turkey, polling stations opened this Sunday morning for the second round of the presidential election and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is the favorite. Yet lagging behind in the polls, weakened by the economic situation and the earthquake in February, the outgoing head of state finally edged his main opponent by almost five points in the first round of the presidential election. So much so that in Istanbul, supporters of Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu no longer believe too much in victory. Europe 1 visited the famous Galata Bridge.
“We will have to watch the ballot boxes”
“Today, I only half believe it.” A young man casts his line in the distance to kill time, the view of the horizon and the setting sun over the hills and mosques. Fish wriggle in a tank at his feet. He is calm and is already talking about his candidate in the past tense. “It would have been advantageous for me, who is Kurdish, for Kılıçdaroğlu to be elected, in particular to free political prisoners”, he explains. “This first round was a shock. And then I know that in Turkey, there is fraud during the votes. We will have to watch the ballot boxes.”
Along the blue barrier that separates it from the Bosphorus, four young people are seated among the groups of fishermen. They open a few beers to music, resigned. “We won the elections in all the big cities: Istanbul, Izmir, Antalya. But we did not succeed in convincing the countryside and the east of the country”, regrets a young woman. “All TV channels are controlled by Erdoğan, this is the main reason for our failure. He has been in power for 20 years, he will hang on.”
She explains that the song they are listening to is political against the Islamo-conservative Erdoğan. A hymn to love, meetings and dialogue which the president, “if elected, will deprive us of for the next few years”.