Erdogan mocks opposition as authoritarian president reclaims power in election run-off

Recep Tayyip Erdogan has clinched yet another electoral victory in a second round run-off in the Turkish general election.

President Erdogan ended with just over 52% of the vote after half the electorate in his deeply polarised country did not back his authoritarian vision of Turkey.

Turkey’s long-time president secured another five years in power, ridiculing his opponent Kemal Kilicdaroglu before cheering crowds outside his enormous palace on the edge of Ankara, and taking aim at a jailed Kurdish leader and the LGBT community.

Kilicdaroglu complained of “the most unfair election in recent years”, being unable to fend off the well-drilled Erdogan campaign and falling more than two million votes behind.

Erdogan taunted his opponent’s defeat with the words “Bye, bye, Kemal”, pouring scorn on the main opposition party’s increase in its number of MPs in the parliamentary vote two weeks earlier.

He condemned the opposition alliance’s pro-LGBT policies, which he said were in contrast with his own focus on families.

Supporters came from all over Ankara to taste the victory. There were Islamic chants, while some laid Turkish flags on the grass to pray.

Tackling inflation is Turkey’s most urgent issuue, at an annual rate of almost 44%, with the cost of food, rent and other everyday goods having soared, and Erdogan refusing to observe orthodox economic policy and raise interest rates.

Instead, Erdogan celebrated his election by accusing his opposite number of siding with terrorists, and criticised him for promising to free a former co-leader of Turkey’s second largest opposition party, the pro-Kurdish HDP. Selahattin Demirtas has been languishing in jail since 2016, despite the European Court of Human Rights ordering his release. Erdogan said while he was in power, Demirtas would stay behind bars.

He also promised to prioritise rebuilding in areas hit by February’s twin earthquakes and bring about the “voluntary” return of a million Syrian refugees.

Since a failed coup in 2016, Erdogan has abolished the post of prime minister and amassed extensive powers, which his opponent had pledged to roll back.

Turkey’s opposition will now have to regroup ahead of local elections in 2024. Kilicdaroglu’s party has two popular mayors running Ankara and Istanbul – and one of them might have had a better chance of winning the presidential race.