'Erdoğan is calculating to stay in office until he dies'

While the echoes of AKP Chairman and President Erdoğan's 'last election' statement—similar to those he has made before—continue, the prevailing interpretation is that this remark is a step taken to change the agenda and reverse the negative poll results for the AKP in the local elections.

Journalist Fatih Yaşlı also commented on these discussions in his column titled 'Is it the last election or presidency until death?'. The relevant parts of Yaşlı's column are as follows:

"Of course, it is a bluff, a test of the waters, a lie; Erdoğan is calculating to stay in office until he dies, and he will do whatever is necessary for this. Currently, there is no obstacle in front of him for this; if he plays his game cleverly, he will get what he wants: the presidency until death. Because all components of the establishment politics, let alone trying to topple Erdoğan, are building all their plans on continuing with Erdoğan and are calculating to meet him at a certain level of bargaining.

Let us give an ironic example: It is no coincidence that on the days when Bahçeli was addressing Erdoğan at the MHP congress saying 'you cannot leave,' the Kurdish movement from the exact opposite side was also saying 'the number one interlocutor for a solution is Erdoğan' and calling for a new table; because in establishment politics, no one has a vision of a Turkey without Erdoğan.

It is clear why the MHP and Bahçeli are wrapping Erdoğan in cotton wool; the MHP, which has been a 'state party' from the beginning, has reached a level of power within the state today that it did not even have during the Nationalist Front government periods, despite not being an official government partner. The MHP is step-by-step implementing a long-term strategy of staffing the bureaucracy, especially in the police and judiciary.

The rising 'Erdoğanism' of the Kurdish movement—at least one wing of it—in recent times is much less understandable. As if there were a deep state separate from Erdoğan, saying that Erdoğan could persuade that deep state to find a solution, showing him as the address for a solution together with Öcalan, and calling for a return to the February 28 protocol or demanding a new solution process—unless there is something we do not know—are things that have no karşılık (reception/basis) today.

No, the partnership with the MHP is not the only reason; Erdoğan himself does not want to enter into any dialogue with Kurdish politics in the foreseeable future. Because, firstly, Erdoğan is openly building a 'security state' and is keeping other actors within the state together through this securitarian paradigm, and is making them accept his leadership through this same paradigm. The reason why the Fidan-Kalın duo is increasingly coming to the fore in state administration is this securitarian architectural process.

And secondly, this securitarian paradigm has a reception in society; Erdoğan has gotten a taste of herding the masses through the securitarian paradigm and the nationalism it is built upon, and there is no reason for him to give this up. On the contrary, investments in the war industry, the propaganda made through them, the discourse of survival (beka), and the fight against terrorism have turned into the biggest trump card in Erdoğan's hand in a Turkey where bread is shrinking and making a living is becoming increasingly difficult.

The possibility that this security state will organize a very large operation in Northern Iraq—and perhaps in Syria—after the elections is increasing. The visits of the Fidan-Kalın duo to the US, the security meeting held with Iraq and the agreement reached, the meetings with Barzani, the Iraqi Turkmen Front, and the Popular Mobilization Forces, Erdoğan's statements... All of these are signs of what is approaching.

Since such an operation is imminent and this is an Erdoğan project itself, it is impossible for the calls for peace made to Erdoğan to find a response; therefore, more security, more militarism, and more nationalism remain as tools in the hands of the AKP, and new stories can only be built upon these.

We can best understand that the AKP has no story left to tell by looking at the election process. There is nothing that can be offered to people outside of an empty 'Century of Turkey' literature; it is known to everyone that inflation, even if everything goes well—which we can be sure it will not—can only reach single digits in 2026.

However, while this is the case, there is no opposition against the government that can tell its own story to society and become a genuine option. Even if the AKP's votes drop—which they will, albeit slightly—and even if the opposition manages to hold onto the metropolitan cities, the probability of them increasing their votes significantly is weak; because the public does not see a genuine hope here.

This makes the March 31 elections a 'strange' election; neither side can promise hope and excitement to society regarding the period after April 1. On the contrary, both sides see that the situation will get worse after the election, and the opposition cannot generate energy from this to stop the bad course, while the government can no longer hide this from society.

Therefore, on April 1, a stalemate will emerge where the government has weakened but the opposition has not strengthened, and this will be accompanied by a deepening multi-crisis conjuncture. The first signs of this have already begun to arrive; the austerity program under the name of fighting inflation will turn into a throat-tightening program, and price hikes and taxes will rain down on the public.

In this process, it is highly likely that the government will implement a very comprehensive military operation to manage all this course of events. Thus, they will both gather under the banner of nationalism and easily silence the opposition and dissenting voices.

Whether new constitutional initiatives will start during or at the end of this process, and whether a political climate built on a securitarian paradigm and the polarization created through it will give Erdoğan the chance to find the number of votes in Parliament to take a new constitution to a referendum, we do not know, but everything possible will be done so that the March 31 elections are not Erdoğan's 'last election,' and society will once again be made to say 'Oh Lord, for the sake of a presidency'."