Although voting was to start at 8 a.m., I had to go to my balloting station at about 7.30 a.m. as I was traveling abroad and had an early flight to catch. I was not expecting to see many people there other than election officials, but astonishingly enough there were long queues in front of each election room. The day was a Sunday, and these people wouldn't be going to work. Several of them looked like homemakers, anyway. One could see people from all segments of society in the queues. It was obvious that these people took the business of voting and their votes seriously. I thought pictures of these queues should also be part of the military schools' curricula. The fact that more than 85 percent of the electorate cast ballots in this local election is a telling addition to these pictures. The election results in the late evening gave me a second surprise in the same day. The electors made wise choices, and what is more they did not sheepishly or blindly follow their favorite parties. If they didn't like the mayoral candidate, they didn't vote for him, but for the special provincial assembly they voted for their favorite party. It was unimaginable to see that according to the special provincial assembly election results, the Justice and Development Party (AKP) was the first party in 61 provinces, but they were able to win mayoral elections in only 46 cities.
Kurdish voters have indicated that they have nor been happy with AKP's record and did not find its attempts at democratization satisfactory. Unlike the July 22, 2007 elections, this time an overwhelming majority of Kurds did nor vote for Erdoğan. It is obvious that they are disappointed and think the AKP is becoming a nationalist and oligarchic, bureaucracy-friendly party. Sadly for the AKP, voters in several western cities that have attracted Kurdish migrants in recent years -- resentful Turks -- voted for the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), which spread propaganda in these cities that the AKP is a pro-Kurdish party.
The economic crisis has taken its toll as well, and several people made it obvious that they resented Erdoğan's remarks that "there is not any serious crisis in the country and those who went bankrupt lost their businesses not because of any crisis but because of their lack of professionalism."
He has unwisely tried nationalist rhetoric to counterattack the nationalist CHP and MHP, but it obviously does not work with the Kurds. Liberals have suspicions over his reformist spirit and whether he has an agreement with the military not to reform Turkey too much (!). Several voters in big cities watch people close to the AKP getting rich very fast, and even AKP voters are talking about this more loudly.
It is obvious that Erdoğan needs a formula that will keep his party as the part of all Turkey, a formula that would attract the most people in this country. Could it be an energetic and sincere democratization program and pro-EU reform? President Abdullah Gül declared that 2008 would be the year of the EU, but now we all know that it was not. Erdoğan has delayed the reforms since the July 22, 2007 elections and has focused on almost exclusively on local elections. The end result is that he was warned, if not punished, in the local elections. (This time the military was wise enough not to increase his votes by posting silly antidemocratic and antireligious e-memos on its Web site.)
More sadly for him, none of his advisors, close circle, members of the Cabinet and so on was able to warn him beforehand. He has to think on the possible reasons.
