It’s worth looking at what happened in Ekrem İmamoğlu’s case, which you’ve linked to. As of today, Ekrem İmamoğlu is the sitting mayor of Istanbul, awaiting pending multiple courts upholding the verdict in his trial. İmamoğlu endorsed the head of his party, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, as a presidential candidate, with İmamoğlu to serve as vice-president (though ultimately there were 7 (!) people set to serve as VP, so I don’t know how meaningful this is). Kılıçdaroğlu won 48% of the vote in the presidential election. I haven’t seen a detailed postmortem on how Erdoğan beat the polls, but there was no “virtually guaranteeing victory” in this election.
Also importantly: Erdoğan took power in 2003! He was 49. It took him 20 years to bring Turkey to the state it’s in, and I don’t think he has another 20 in him. If you want to turn your country into a dictatorship, you have to be young: Putin was 47, Chavez 45. This isn’t a quick process, and if your candidate for doing it is 75, they’re not likely to succeed. This is part of why I don’t see your “over the next decade” holding up.
Nitpick: Erdogan’s party won the 2002 elections, and Erdogan became Prime Minister in 2003. I’m not sure where you got the year 2004 from, but it’s not correct.
It’s worth looking at what happened in Ekrem İmamoğlu’s case, which you’ve linked to. As of today, Ekrem İmamoğlu is the sitting mayor of Istanbul, awaiting pending multiple courts upholding the verdict in his trial. İmamoğlu endorsed the head of his party, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, as a presidential candidate, with İmamoğlu to serve as vice-president (though ultimately there were 7 (!) people set to serve as VP, so I don’t know how meaningful this is). Kılıçdaroğlu won 48% of the vote in the presidential election. I haven’t seen a detailed postmortem on how Erdoğan beat the polls, but there was no “virtually guaranteeing victory” in this election.
Also importantly: Erdoğan took power in 2003! He was 49. It took him 20 years to bring Turkey to the state it’s in, and I don’t think he has another 20 in him. If you want to turn your country into a dictatorship, you have to be young: Putin was 47, Chavez 45. This isn’t a quick process, and if your candidate for doing it is 75, they’re not likely to succeed. This is part of why I don’t see your “over the next decade” holding up.
Nitpick: Erdogan’s party won the 2002 elections, and Erdogan became Prime Minister in 2003. I’m not sure where you got the year 2004 from, but it’s not correct.
Typo, fixed. I believe I got his age right.