„Turcia se confruntă cu un viitor neclar pentru economia și democrația sa, conform unui editorial publicat de Financial Times.”

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has little time to celebrate his electoral victory, according to an editorial in The Financial Times. Despite his announcement that „Turkey is the only winner” after winning the second round of the presidential election, millions of Turks are concerned about the future of their country under an authoritarian leader. Erdogan’s economic policies, which include attacking interest rate increases, have led to the lira being devalued and inflation rising to about 44%. The situation has been aggravated by Erdogan’s apparent disregard for the independence of the country’s central bank, his flagrantly electoral handouts, and a looming current account deficit. The new president must abandon his personal whims, return to conventional monetary policy, and take serious steps to restore the credibility of the country’s institutions if Ankara is to have any chance of persuading hesitant investors to return. Unfortunately, if Erdogan continues to behave as he has in the past, instability may endure in Turkey’s relationship with the West. There are also concerns about what Erdogan’s victory means for democracy in Turkey, one of NATO’s members. Since coming to power 21 years ago, Erdogan has consolidated power and centralized the decision-making process to unprecedented levels, resulting in a near-autocratic regime. Erdogan has replaced Turkey’s parliamentary democracy with an all-powerful presidential executive regime after a constitutional referendum in 2017. The electoral environment is now unfair, with the majority of the press under government influence and opposition members, including politicians, journalists, academics, and business people, in jail. Selahattin Demirtas, the imprisoned leader of the Kurdish-dominated Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), is on the list of prisoners. The risk of being excluded from political life, including imprisonment, looms over Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu, a leading figure in the Republican People’s Party (CHP) and one of Erdogan’s opponents. Many other Turks are undoubtedly concerned about their civil liberties. Erdogan repeatedly attacked his opponent Kemal Kilicdaroglu in the election campaign, insinuating that Kilicdaroglu supported LGBT rights and terrorists, a thinly veiled reference to his appeal to Kurdish voters. While Erdogan’s supporters will tout his new electoral victory as evidence of his unbridled popularity, the reality is that Erdogan was forced into the second round after neither he nor Kilicdaroglu were able to achieve over 50% of the vote, illustrating the political divide between those who admire him and those who detest him. According to the constitution, this is Erdogan’s final term. Regardless of what he chooses to do next, Turkey is still at risk of entering a troubled time.