Turkey’s Tayyip Erdogan unofficially kicked off his re-election campaign on Saturday, vowing to defeat the secularist opposition in “historic” snap elections that he has called for June.
Turkey's Erdogan starts campaigning for snap June elections
STEPANAKERT, APRIL 30, ARTSAKHPRESS:Although yet to formally declare his candidacy, Erdogan held what was effectively his first campaign rally in the coastal city of Izmir, the stronghold of the secular CHP opposition party, Reuters reports.
He promised thousands of flag-waving supporters victory in the presidential and parliamentary polls and declared the leader of the CHP, Kemal Kilicdaroglu, a dictator.
“I believe we will make a political history on June 24 with record votes both on parliamentary and presidential elections,” Erdogan said.
If Erdogan wins - as seems likely as the AK Party has formed an election alliance with the national opposition party MHP - he will return to the presidency with new sweeping executive powers that were narrowly approved by referendum last year.
Impatient to get those new powers, Erdogan last week called the elections more than a year earlier than scheduled as he said Turkey needed a more powerful presidency to confront economic challenges and the war in Syria.
