Erdogan Takes the Lead in Turkey's Runoff Election: Live Updates and Results
Paying respects in March to four family members who were buried at a cemetery in Antakya, Turkey, in the aftermath of powerful earthquakes.
OSMANIYE, Turkey — When powerful earthquakes struck southern Turkey on Feb. 6, killing more than 50,000 people and destroying hundreds of thousands of buildings, many expected the disaster to harm President Recep Tayyip Erdogan at the ballot box.
The vast destruction raised questions about whether his government’s rush to develop properties had resulted in unsafe buildings, and many earthquake survivors complained that the government’s initial response had been slow, leaving people trapped in the rubble or shivering in the cold as they waited for food and shelter.
But the results from the first round of Turkey’s presidential election on May 14 — which set the stages for Sunday’s runoff — indicated that the disaster had a limited effect on how residents of the afflicted area voted.
“I am definitely an Erdogan supporter,” said Eda Akgul, who was still living in a white tent near her damaged house nearly four months after the earthquake.
She had also survived a smaller earthquake in the southeastern province of Elazig in 2020, she said, and expected Mr. Erdogan to help now as he had helped then.
“Erdogan made really good contributions to Elazig after the earthquake there,” she said. “Otherwise, the people wouldn’t have voted for him.”
Interviews with quake survivors indicated many reasons that the disaster had not changed their political outlook. Some described the quake as an act of God that any government would have struggled to respond to. Some whose homes were destroyed said they had more faith in Mr. Erdogan to rebuild the affected areas than they had in his challenger, the opposition leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu.
Mr. Erdogan, who won 49.5 percent of the first round vote against Mr. Kilicdaroglu’s 44.9 percent, came out ahead in eight of the 11 provinces affected by February’s earthquake. His governing Justice and Development Party and its political allies fared even better, winning a majority of votes in the simultaneous parliamentary elections in all but one of the quake-stricken provinces.
Voter participation in the earthquake zone was also high, despite worries that many voters displaced by the destruction would struggle to return home to cast their ballots. Although participation in the 11 quake-affected provinces was lower than the 88.9 percent of eligible voters who cast ballots nationally, in none of those provinces did turnout dip below 80 percent.
In Osmaniye, where Ms. Akgul lives, the quake’s destruction is clear. There are empty lots where buildings that collapsed once stood and blue and white tents sheltering quake survivors are scattered around town.
Instead of voting based on the government’s quake response, residents said they focused on other issues.
Suleyman Asilturk, who runs a tobacco shop in the center of town, said he preferred nationalist politicians such as Mr. Erdogan because of the town’s history of sending young men to the military to fight Kurdish militants who have been fighting a bloody, decades-long battle against the state for autonomy.
“We have given so many martyrs,” Mr. Asilturk said, referring to local soldiers killed in action. “Our vote will go to the patriots again.”
Source: The New York Times
