Turkey’s ‘Blame Game’ Elections

By Bayraktar Bora

Turkey went to the polls on June 7 this year and voted to end the Justice and Development Party’s (AKP) 13 years of one-party rule. The key to this development was the Kurdish-socialist coalition, the Peoples’ Democratic Party’s (HDP), which broke the 10 percent threshold needed to take seats in parliament. Two and a half months has now passed since the elections and Turkey still does not have a government that reflects this political change, all coalition attempts have failed and a new election has been called for November. The price of this political crisis is rising every day.

The Turkish Lira is at a record low against dollar, recently decreasing from 2.79 to 3.00 within a week. The three-year peace process between Kurds and Turkey is in pieces, on Wednesday 12 Turkish soldiers were killed in an ambush. Turkish fighter jets have also targeted PKK bases in Northern Iraq, killing nearly 400 militants, according to official numbers. People are not happy with the situation, they are worried. Everybody in Ankara knows that people will punish whichever political party they hold responsible for this mess. For this reason the next election campaigns will become a blame game among parties. 

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Source: Euronews