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ISTANBUL With Turkeys presidential and parliamentary electionsless than six weeks away on May 14, public opinion polls are showing a tight contest between the two dominant candidates President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and opposition leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu.

Over the weekend one of Turkeys most respected polling companies, MetroPoll,revealed that its March research on voters attitudes showed a slender 2.6% lead for Kilicdaroglu, who heads the Republican Peoples Party (CHP) and is the candidate of the Nation Alliance.

Results from MetroPolls research since the start of the year saw Kilicdaroglu closing the gap. Support for Erdogan fell from 45.9% in January to 42% in March a period that saw Turkey hit by devastating earthquakes, leading to criticism of the governments response while those backing Kilicdaroglu rose from 43% to 44.6%.

However, further details show a more nuanced picture in the race between the two favorites.

Responding to the question of whether Kilicdaroglu would win the May 14 race, which could go to a runoff two weeks later if no candidate receives more than half of the votes, 43% said he would win while nearly 50% said he would not.

However, a growing number of people expect a Kilicdaroglu victory, up from nearly 32% in December, when some 60% said he would not win. In three months, the gap has closed to a great extent, MetroPoll director Ozer Sencar said.

The same question about Erdogan saw some 48% expecting the president to cement his third term of office while 45% said he would lose.

Asked their likelihood of voting for Kilicdaroglu, nearly 45% responded positively while more than 49% said they would not. Meanwhile, nearly 44% said they would back Erdogan and 52% refused to support his candidacy.

Commenting on Kilicdaroglus 2.6% lead, Sencar said the data showed that the fate of the election will be determined by Muharrem Ince and the undecided. Ince is one of the four presidential candidates. He stood against Erdogan for the CHP-led alliance in the 2018 election, when he was defeated in the first round.

Soner Cagaptay,director of the Turkish Research Program at the Washington Institute, said Ince and the other candidate, Sinan Ogan, could drain votes from Kilicdaroglu, divide the opposition on May 14 and take the race to a runoff on May 28.

Other polls have shown greater levels of support for Kilicdaroglu. TAG Research last week showed the CHP leader at nearly 51.8% while Erdogan polled 42.6%. The other candidates, Ince and Ogan, received 3.2% and 2.5%, respectively.

In the partisan world of Turkish opinion polls, however, there are some predicting a win for Erdogan. A survey carried out by Optimar Research in March showed Erdogan ahead at 47.4% while Kilicdaroglu followed at 45.3%.

Among voter groups, research points to women and young people favoring the opposition.

Research published Thursday by the Social Democracy Foundation on womens voting intentions in the parliamentary election, which is to be held alongside the presidential vote, showed a switch from Erdogans Justice and Development Party (AKP) to the CHP.

Some 38% of respondents said they cast their ballots for the AKP in the 2018 parliamentary election but only 27% said they would vote for the ruling party in an immediate election. While 28% said they backed the CHP in 2018, that figure rose by two percentage points in the forthcoming vote.

Another crucial demographic is young voters. Some six million people will vote for the first time next month, a group that has known nothing but Erdogans 20-year rule. Around 13 million voters under the age of 25 will take part.

According to Erdal Akaltun, president of Bupar Research and Consultancy, eight out of 10 young people will vote for candidates from outside the AKP-led Peoples Alliance.

The possibility of a change in power in the existing order for the first time excites the youth, Akaltun said, citing a recent survey by his firm.

Edgar Sar, cofounder of the IstanPol Institute, said most young voters had been influenced by the governments increasingly authoritarian approach.

Generation Z was 15 years old during the Gezi Park period in 2013, he said, referring to nationwide anti-government protests a decade ago.From that age, they saw the period when the AKP started to become authoritarian and they could not access the social opportunities that the previous generation had.

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Neck and neck race in Turkey between Erdogan and Kilicdaroglu - Al-Monitor

Turkeys President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has angrily hit out at a visit paid by the American ambassador to Ankara to his main presidential election opponent, telling his supporters that they should teach theUS a lesson.

We need to teach America a lesson in these elections, said Erdogan, referencing US Ambassador Jeff Flakes visit to the oppositions joint candidate Kemal Kilicdaroglu last week. Joe Biden speaks from there, what is Biden's ambassador doing here? He goes to visit Mr Kemal. It's a shame, give your head some work. You are the ambassador. Your interlocutor here is the president.

Prior to the April 2 remarksreported by Middle East Eyemade to a small gathering of people at an Istanbul branch of the Turkish ultra-nationalist Idealist Hearths group, commonly known as the Grey Wolves, Erdogan had said little that was critical of the West while on the campaign trail ahead of the May 14 national elections. But Flakes visit appeared to touch a nerve.

Referring to Flake, Erdogan also said: How are you going to ask for an appointment from the president from now on?

Our doors are now closed to him. You cannot see [me] anymore. Why? You will know your limit. You will know your duty as ambassador. You will learn how an ambassador works, he added.

Erdogan has never had a smooth relationship with the Biden administration. In August 2020, Erdogans officials were angered when an interview with Biden, filmed by the New York Times the previous December, was released featuring the then presidential candidate Biden describing the Turkish leader as an autocrat.

In the interview, Biden criticised Erdogans policy towards the Kurds, and added that, He has to pay a price, before stating that Washington should embolden Turkish opposition leaders to be able to take on and defeat Erdogan. Not by a coup, not by a coup, but by the electoral process.

In a fair election, Turkeys pro-Kurdish Peoples Democratic Party (HDP)could indeed prove to be the kingmaker that topples Erdogan. The HDP last month announced that it would not put forward its own presidential candidate. That move means its supporters can vote for Kilicdaroglu. The Kurds account for up to a fifth of Turkeys population.

Election tensions were heightened on March 31 after two bullets hit the Istanbul office of the opposition IYI (Good) party.

A night guard at a nearby construction site was apprehended and, according to the authorities, told police that he accidentally hit the party's office building with gunshots while he was chasing thieves.

However, IYI party leader Meral Aksener linked the incident to inflammatory comments made toward her by Erdogan earlier in the week. In those remarks, Erdogan snapped at Akseners criticism of him, saying: She is messing with the wrong people. Be careful, dont get yourself in trouble with me.

Kilicdaroglu, meanwhile, has promised that if elected he will repeal the law that makes insulting the president a crime.

On the markets, bond traders have been trimming bearish Turkey bets on a possible Erdogan defeat.

By some accounts, Erdogan sees a path to victory in a second round of run-off voting that would be opened up by a strong performance by a third candidate, Muharrem Ince, in the first round.

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Angry Erdogan wants election victory 'to teach America a lesson' - bne IntelliNews

The Americans and the British tried to draw Turkey into a war with Russia, and only thanks to the efforts of the authorities it did not happen, said President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. According to him, there were about ten versions of emergencies, including military provocations, killing of diplomats, terrorist attacks, hijacking of tourists, accidents with grain carriers and even an explosion at a nuclear power plant, followed by blaming Russia. All of these actions, according to the politician, could be aimed at weakening Turkey itself, selling it weapons and creating havoc on the entire coast. Erdogan did not rule out the possibility of his physical elimination, because against the background of the explosions of the Crimean bridge or the Northern Streams it is not a problematic operation for the Anglo-Saxons at all, and it does not matter at all how many people will die in the process.

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Erdogan declares that the West tried to draw Turkey into war with ... - TVR

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has refused to take the Eurasianist Patriotic Party (Vatan) into his electoral alliance for the 14 May polls, according toDogu Perincek, the chairman of the party.

Perincek said in a press conference on Wednesday that he held two separate meetings with Erdogan to discuss the possibility of joining the Peoples Alliance, led by the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP).

He personally told me that he doesnt want to run with the Vatan Party in the elections, he said. We have to declare it out loud: the Peoples Alliances decision to reject the Vatan Party is no doubt a choice.

"They have chosen the path of submission tothe United States over Turkeys independence and security.

Perincek represents a fringe element of political ideology in Turkey that is an unusual combination of Turkish ultra-nationalism, Maoist leftism and ultra-secularism along with close ties to Russia, China and Syria.

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The Turkish public has always been aware of the existence of Eurasianists - nationalists who see Turkey's aims and geography linked to Russia and China - within the senior ranks of the armed forces and state bureaucracy.

Perincek was specifically angry at the fact that Erdogan decided to add the Islamist pro-Kurdish Free Cause Party (Huda-Par) to his alliance despite the fact that they are separatists.

The opposition rallies against Huda Par due to its association with the armed group Hizbullah, a Turkey-based Kurdish organisation that targeted feminist conservative intellectuals and state officers in the 1990s in a series of brutal assassinations. The movement later disavowed violence.

They have made an effort to justify their cooperation with Huda Par, which has included in its programme a pledge to remove the concept of the Turkish nation from the constitution and aims to make Kurdish the official language, Perincek said.

Erdogans decision to employ a more independent foreign policy following the 2016 coup attempt empowered Perincek, who is believed to have followers within the state.

The degree of his influence within actual policy-making circles is a subject of debate, but Erdogans flourishing ties with Moscow and Beijing in recent years earned Perincek outsized media attention.

He travelled to those countries, claiming to play a mediating role, even in the recent reconciliation between Ankara and Damascus.

Who is Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the man charged with removing Erdogan?

Selim Koru, an analyst at the Ankara-based Tepav think tank, believes Erdogan doesnt really like Perincek due to his attitude that gives too much importance to him and his party in relations with Moscow and Beijing.

It is as if he alone is going to bridge the differences after Turkey leans towards the Eurasian axis, Koru told Middle East Eye. He doesnt have votes, and he doesnt bring anything to the table. He doesnt mean anything.

Perincek struggled to collect 100,000 signatures that are required to run for the presidential race scheduled for 14 May. He couldnt pass 25,000.

In the 2018 presidential elections, he was able to collect 110,000 signatures. But he only received 98,000 votes.

One of Erdogan's close friends, businessman Ethem Sancak, is now a deputy chairman of the Patriotic Party, after having been forced to leave the AKP due to a statement which suggested Erdogan and his party were brought to power thanks to Washington.

Sancak also criticised Turkey for providing drones and weaponry to Ukraine against Russia last year.

Koru believes Erdogan doesnt want any trouble during the election period, and certainly wouldnt want to draw Western attention to a fringe party as an alliance partner that doesnt offer anything to him.

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Turkey elections: Erdogan 'rejects alliance' with Eurasianist party - Middle East Eye

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was mayor of Istanbul when a devastating earthquake hit Izmit in 1999, killing more than 17,000 people and devastating the countrys economy. The governments shambolic response to the natural disaster created an opportunity for Erdogan to burnish his credentials as a capable and compassionate leader, setting the stage for his election as premier in 2003.

Erdogan has maintained an iron rule ever since, outliving economic downturns, refugee crises, corruption scandals, protests movements, and even a coup attempt. But with the May 14 presidential and parliamentary elections just around the corner, seismic shifts both literal and figurative are threatening to upend the presidents grip on power for the first time in two decades.

The most obvious challenge to Erdogans reelection is his botched response to the earthquakes that rocked Turkey and Syria in February, which claimed over 45,000 lives and internally displaced some two million people across ten provinces. Accounts from the ground broadcast over social media told a story of overwhelming government incompetence, from delayed rescue efforts and assistance to affected areas to misuse of available resources to an inability to quell unrest and establish public order. Many Turkish citizens also blame Erdogans consolidation of power and populist policies for allowing shoddy construction to grow unchecked. While the president may be able to weaponize his control of the media and government spending to contain the immediate political fallout, the damage to his credibility as a steady hand is already done.

Read More: How Erdoans Obsession With Power Got in the Way of Turkeys Earthquake Response

The second and perhaps more significant challenge to Erdogans rule is a main opposition bloc that is for the first time in ages united behind a joint presidential candidate, Peoples Republican Party (CHP) leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu. Kilicdaroglu has surprised everyone by managing to consolidate much of Turkeys notoriously fractious opposition under the umbrella of the Nation Alliance, which comprises social-democrat, center-right, right-wing, and Islamist parties, at the same time as hes expanded support for the bloc.

To have a shot at beating Erdogan, Kilicdaroglu needs to win over the pro-Kurdish Peoples Democratic Party (HDP) and its left-wing Labor and Freedom Alliancethe elections kingmakerswithout alienating his biggest coalition partner, the Turkish nationalist and conservative Good Party (IP). This is a tricky balancing act but one hes proving capable of pulling off. The CHP leader successfully mended his relationship with the IP after a public row over his engagement with the HDP, and the HDP has already signaled its support for Kilicdaroglu by refraining from fielding a candidate of its own.

Recent polls accordingly show Kilicdaroglu leading the president, although neither candidate likely to attain a first-round win. As things stand, the HDP is also likely to hand the anti-Erdogan Nation Alliance a slim majority in parliament. Critically, an opposition victory in the parliamentary elections would boost Kilicdaroglus chances in the second round of the presidential contest.

Of course, its too early to say whether Kilicdaroglu will be able to hold the coalition together and sustain his momentum. For example, the HDP could make demands that are non-starters for IP such as cabinet posts or regional autonomy, which would undermine opposition unity.

Erdogan is also a skilled politician with ample experience leveraging his bully pulpit. Having already dismantled or hollowed out most independent checks on his power, including the military, the judiciary, and the media, the president will use any means at his disposalhowever heavy-handed or anti-democraticto tilt the scales in his favor. At a minimum, he will ramp up state-financed handouts to buy votes and try to link the HDP with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) to paint his chief rival as a terrorist sympathizer. Should he feel cornered enough, he could jail opposition leaders under false pretenses and criminalize dissent. Yet nothing he does at this point is likely to earn the president much genuine support outside of his core voter baseeven if fear tactics and repression help him secure another term.

One thing is clear: In the 20 years hes been in power, Erdogans political fortunes have never been on shakier footing.

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Erdogan's Political Reign Has Never Been on Shakier Footing - TIME