Two opposing visions for Turkey’s future are on the ballot when voters return to the polls on Sunday for a runoff presidential election that will decide between an increasingly authoritarian incumbent and a challenger who has pledged to restore democracy. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a populist and polarising leader who has ruled Turkey for 20 years, is well positioned to win after falling just short of victory in the first round of balloting on May 14.
He was the top finisher even as the country reels from sky-high inflation and the effects of a devastating earthquake in February. Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the leader of Turkey’s pro-secular main opposition party and a six-party alliance, has campaigned on a promise to undo Erdogan’s authoritarian tilt.
The 74-year-old former bureaucrat has described the runoff as a referendum on the direction of the strategically located NATO country, which is at the crossroads of Europe and Asia and has a key say over the alliance’s expansion.
“This is an existential struggle. Turkey will either be dragged into darkness or light,” Kilicdaroglu said. “This is more than an election. It has turned into a referendum.” In a bid to sway nationalist voters ahead of Sunday’s runoff, the normally soft-mannered Kilicdaroglu (pronounced KEH-lich-DAHR-OH-loo) shifted gear and hardened his stance, vowing to send back millions of refugees if he is elected and rejecting any possibility of peace negotiations with Kurdish militants.
