It is confirmed by PENTAPOSTAGMA that the elections in Turkey are postponed due to Monday's devastating earthquake. A Turkish official spoke of "very serious difficulties" in holding the elections on the scheduled date.
As we wrote, now Erdoğan, with the decision to declare a state of emergency for 3 months, leaves open the possibility of postponing the elections, after he will consider how he will conduct polls throughout this 3-month period, in which he will attempt to restore a large part of the damage caused by the earthquakes.
Monday's earthquake and massive scale of destruction in southern Turkey pose "significant difficulties" for elections scheduled to be held in mid-May, a Turkish official said today, in the first indication that authorities may be considering postponing the polls.
President Tayyip Erdogan, seeking to extend his stay in power for a third decade, said last month that elections would be held on May 14. Polls released before the earthquake suggested it would be the toughest electoral challenge he has faced to date.
Erdogan's popularity has already been eroded by soaring living costs and the sinking lira. He is now facing a wave of criticism over his government's response to Turkey's deadliest earthquake since 1999, shortly before he came to power.
"The logistical challenge" for holding elections is enormous
Whatever is the political impact of the disaster, the logistical challenge of holding elections in the affected areas is enormous. About 13 million people live in the area affected by the earthquakes, and hundreds of thousands need somewhere to stay after the earthquake destroyed their homes or it is too dangerous to live in them again.
"It's really too early to talk about the elections," said the Turkish official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, according to APE-MPE. "There has been a state of emergency for three months already. 15% of the population lives in that area, an area that produces almost 10% of the Renewable Energy Sources."
He said Erdogan's AK Party (AKP) and its parliamentary ally MHP would look into the matter, but hinted that it was too early to decide anything in the immediate aftermath of the earthquake and while the death toll was still rising.
It will be difficult to hold the elections in Turkey on May 14
"It seems that we have come out of the pre-election period we entered. We will review developments, but at the moment there are serious difficulties in holding elections on May 14."
Erdogan was expected to formally announce in March that presidential and parliamentary elections would be held on May 14 instead of mid-June as planned. Criticism of Turkey's emergency response to the earthquake is mounting, with survivors and opposition politicians accusing the government of a slow and inadequate relief effort.
Turkish journalist Can Dudar, who lives abroad and was sentenced in absentia to 27 years in prison on charges of espionage and aiding a terrorist organization, said Erdogan came to power in the wake of the 1999 earthquake and may be driven out by the latter.
Criticism of the response to the 1999 earthquake, in which 17,000 people died, was one of the factors that led to a decline in support for the then government, which helped the AKP triumph in 2002.
"Erdogan came to power in the wake of the 1999 earthquake, it looks like he will leave in the wake of the 2023 earthquake," Dudar said in a video on Twitter. "This earthquake that has cost the lives of thousands of people will bury him in the debris."
