The profile of the Turkish opposition candidate Kemal Kilicdaroglu and the characteristics that make him a kind of “anti-Erdogan” are analyzed in an article by the German Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ).
He describes him as “colorless”, however he hastens to add that “this is not necessarily a disadvantage.
The text in detail as reproduced by Deutsche Welle:
Can Kemal Kilicdaroglu beat Tayyip Erdogan to win Turkey’s May election?
“It is considered colourless, but this is not necessarily a disadvantage,” points out the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ). And he explains: “The 74-year-old, a former employee of the state social security service, is a kind of anti-Erdogan: without charisma, down-to-earth, moderate, honest. Although Kilicdaroglu has led the Republican People’s Party (CHP) for 13 years, he now, for the first time, has a realistic chance in the May 14 parliamentary and presidential elections to oust the autocratic ruler Erdogan from his palace. Turkey is facing an electoral contest that will determine its fate. Kilicdaroglu is ahead in most opinion polls. For Erdogan, the margins are narrowing. But a lot can happen in four weeks.”
Part of the report comes from Diyarbakir in southeastern Turkey.
Referring to the presumably regulatory role of the pro-Kurdish HDP party, the Frankfurt paper recalls the following:
“In the early years of his rule, Erdogan was rather sympathetic to Diyarbakir. He granted the Kurds more cultural freedoms than the (republican) CHP and held peace talks with the PKK, which the EU also considered a terrorist organization. But when this approach appeared to favor the pro-Kurdish HDP, Erdogan halted the peace process and began criminalizing the party. More than 150 HDP mayors were deposed and some were jailed. On the contrary, since 2010 Kilicdaroglu has been making an effort to make his party a reliable choice for the Kurds.”
Source: News Beast
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