Called ‘the Turkish Gandhi’: Six opposition parties put him forward to take on President Erdogan

Kemal Kiliçdaroglu has lost almost every election in the past thirteen years as leader of Turkey’s largest opposition party. Yet he must dethrone President Erdogan in May. The leader of the secular CHP was put forward on Monday as the joint presidential candidate of an alliance of six opposition parties dubbed the “Table of Six.”

But his candidacy sparked little enthusiasm in opposition circles. Kiliçdaroglu may be the one who brought the six opposition parties together, but why should he be successful this time? Kiliçdaroglu’s candidacy even caused a short-lived crisis within the Table of Six. The nationalist IYI Party, the second largest of the opposition alliance, suddenly withdrew its support for him on Friday. Party leader Meral Aksener felt that Kiliçdaroglu put his personal ambitions above the country: the popular mayors of Istanbul and Ankara have a better chance against Erdogan, according to the polls. Aksener called on the two to do their “duty”, but they did not respond. Aksener returned to the table promising to become vice president if the opposition wins.

Gandhi

The divisions within the opposition were grist to Erdogan’s mill. “I predicted months ago that this would happen,” he responded with a smirk. The intrigues were widely covered by the pro-government press, which has suddenly paid full attention to the opposition in recent days. But the outcome seems to strengthen Kiliçdaroglu’s position. “This is a political coup against Erdogan and should give the opposition a decisive victory in the first round on May 14,” said Hakan Akbas, director of political consultancy Strategic Advisory Services.

That conclusion is very premature. Kiliçdaroglu (73) is not exactly known as a good campaigner. Before entering politics, he was a civil servant and director of the social insurance institution SSK. When he was elected leader of the CHP in 2010, he was nicknamed ‘Gandhi Kemal’ because of his resemblance to the Indian leader, both in appearance and soft-spoken political style. Critics say he lacks the energy and charisma to defeat a political street fighter like Erdogan. He invariably calls him derogatory ‘Bay Kemal’ (Mr. Kemal).

Religion no longer taboo

Under Kiliçdaroglu’s leadership, the CHP has undergone a quiet transformation. As Turkey’s oldest party, founded by Father Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the CHP came to symbolize the dogmatic secularism that dominated Turkish politics for decades. The party was dominated by the old secular elites, who looked down on religious conservatives and ethnic minorities and used polarizing rhetoric. Those elites were mercilessly punished in the 2002 elections that brought Erdogan’s Islamist AKP to power.

Kiliçdaroglu tried to break the influence of the secular elites by democratizing the party and bringing in many young social democrats. The polarizing rhetoric was exchanged for a more inclusive political style. Religion was no longer taboo; the party tried to stop pious voters in the countryside and poor suburbs from teaching them secular ‘civilization’. For example, Kiliçdaroglu tried to dispel the mistrust that many religious Turks harbor towards the CHP. But it would be years before this began to pay off politically.

This was partly due to the people Kiliçdaroglu put forward as a presidential candidate. In 2014, he nominated Islamic academic and diplomat Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, a man with even less charisma than himself. With his religious credentials he could penetrate Erdogan’s supporters, was the idea. But this actually repelled the CHP’s traditional voters. Four years later, he nominated Muharrem Ince, a populist slacker who represented the party’s secular wing. But he failed to attract voters outside of the traditional constituency.

Kiliçdaroglu was more successful as a key political figure who managed to unite the divided opposition. To this end, he built a very diverse coalition of secularists, nationalists, Islamists, Kurds and prominent former party members of Erdogan. The aim is to defeat Erdogan and dismantle his presidential system in favor of the old parliamentary system. The first success came in the 2019 local elections, when the opposition took power in most major cities, including Istanbul and Ankara. The economic malaise was an important factor in this.

Earthquakes

Kiliçdaroglu hopes to build on that success in the parliamentary and presidential elections on May 14. Skyrocketing inflation and the state’s negligence in the devastating earthquakes in the south of the country are boosting his electoral chances. “The [soefi-dichter] Yunus Emre said: ‘If we share what we have we will be satisfied, if we divide it we will perish,'” Kilicdaroglu told thousands of cheering supporters on Monday. “We will rule Turkey with deliberation and compromise. Together we will restore the rule of law and moral governance.”

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Kiliçdaroglu has already vowed to end the corruption that has caused so many buildings to collapse and so many people to die in the earthquakes. His image of an incorruptible bureaucrat comes in handy here.

His weakness, according to many, is that he belongs to Turkey’s Alevi minority, which has traditionally been at odds with the Sunni majority. The fear is that Erdogan will mercilessly exploit this in the election campaign to incite his conservative-religious supporters against Kiliçdaroglu.

But Kiliçdaroglu doesn’t let that fool him. Just as he also stoically absorbs Erdogan’s daily criticism and scorn. He wants to go down in history as the man who revived Turkish democracy. “We are not choosing a pop star,” he once told journalists. “It has to be someone who can both hold the alliance together and oversee the transformation of the state.”