Since the announcement of the inconclusive national election results, events in Iraq have been sliding towards a civil war. In addition to this, the U.S. and Iran race for influence and hegemony in the country has speeded up the deterioration of conditions in Iraq. This piece seeks to discuss the latest developments regarding this issue in the light of the decision of the Iraqi parliament, which was issued on June 6, and which called for the sorting and manual re-count of all votes and the abolition of thousands of ballot boxes. This matter puts Iraq into a path of uncertainty during a very critical period.

The political situation has become a bottleneck that may be difficult to get out of, and it is being followed with series of destabilizing events. Unless these issues are being checked upon, Iraq will witness a civil war in a manner very similar to what is going on in Syria and Yemen. An Iraqi political analyst, writing for the daily Baghdad Post (May 23, 2018), stated that: “Iran ignites fire of “civil war” in Iraq… Iran is trying through Qassem Soleimani’s efforts, which is in Iraq now, to ruin all efforts to form a government that would not be totally loyal to her…”

Nouri al-Maliki, ex-premier and the leader of the State of Law election bloc, has joined with Hadi al-Amir’s Naser bloc in a single sectarian bloc, and has declared their hostility to the Moqatada Sadr bloc, which won the most seats in the recent election. The Sadrist project, which has been viewed by many as an Iraqi project, stands against the pro-Iranian Maliki project. The former wants to disband and demobilize the Shiite militia, known as Hashed, improve relations with Iraq’s Arab neighbors, and wants to take a neutral stand in the ongoing U.S. and Iranian rivalry in the Middle East.

Iranians have been involved in many political games such as eliciting dozens of deputies in the coalition of Naser, led by Prime Minister Haidar Abadi, in order to join pro-Iranian political blocs. According to some sources in Baghdad, the pro-Iranian circles have recently inaugurated a series of assassinations in Baghdad in order to fuel the fire of civil war. The explosion in Sadr City, which killed and wounded tens of people in Baghdad on the night of June 7, and the subsequent burning of the election ballot boxes housed in the Independent Electoral High Commission storage in Baghdad are designs of the people that want to push the Sadr group into retaliation and want to create a political rapture in Iraq. If history is any guide to us, Mr. Sadr will not be silent on all these events, even if this requires a full-fledged civil war.

It is noteworthy that al-Maliki made numerous statements in the week leading to the election in which he threatened with civil war if the election results were rigged. Many believe that this was an expression of prior knowledge on his part that he will lose the elections. Those threats “are not new to him, especially since his record is full of manipulating sectarian violence during the past years. It is not unlikely for him to re-start it again, if the course of the events were to his dislike,” wrote an expert on Iraq affairs. After the elections, al-Maliki repeated the same threat through the statement made by an MP from his bloc – Mohamed Sahiod – who told the press on May 17 that, “We demand the abolition of the election results and the extension of the work of parliament and to make the current government of Abadi a Caretaker Government due to the wide scale of fraud which took place in the electoral process.”

Iraq’s parliament passed a law on June 6 ordering a nationwide manual recount of votes in the May 12 parliamentary elections. This was a day after the prime minister had stated that there had been serious violations. This move could hinder the delicate process of forming a new government and raising the prospect of further uncertainty in Iraq. This law has also added further fuel to the fire of crisis and was received with mixed and opposing statements. It appears that Abadi’s bloc, which trailed in third place, has some information suggesting that a manual recount will increase their seats.

The pro-Iranian camp wanted the parliament to go further than by just declaring the election results null and void in order to deny Sadr any opportunity to form the government. The National Coalition of Iyad Allawi, which did not perform well either, has also supported the idea of re-holding the election. Allawi stated that, “the declared results of the elections, as it stands now and without taking into consideration numerous appeals against abuse and large-scale fraud, especially after the United Nations confirmed the existence of fraud and manipulation of votes, will lead to producing a parliament challenged by its legitimacy and an illegitimate government.

Hassan Jihad, a leader in the Coalition of Justice and Democracy in Northern Iraq (Kurdistan), led by Barham Sali, said on June 7 that the decisions of the parliament on the elections restored confidence in the elections and institutions: “The re-counting and manual counting and the application of recent measures will change the number of seats and the results of opposition parties.” He added that, “the ruling parties in the KRG should accept the fact that recounting electoral votes will change the number of seats and it should respect the domestic experience.”

The new election has suspended the work of the Independent Electoral Commission and authorized a Commission made of nine judges to carry out the re-count of votes throughout Iraq. Should this law be applied, it may lead to a series of new crises and complicate the political situation in Iraq in order to reach a state of suffocation. On June 21, the Supreme Court passed a decree, which approved the June 6 law passed by the Iraqi Parliament regarding the manual recount of votes in Iraq as constitutional. This will halt all attempts to form the government and will open hell’s door and further complicate the situation.

It appears that the “biggest beneficiaries of this process are parliamentarian Salim al-Jubouri and the government of Haider al-Abadi.” Al-Jubouri, who failed to regain his seat, believes that he has been done a great deal of injustice in this election. Hassan Turan, a Turkmen MP, was quoted stating, “The high attendance rate during the parliamentary session confirmed beyond doubt that all political blocs, including the winner, wants to distance themselves from the forgers.”

While it may seem that both Iran and the U.S. are distancing themselves from all these rapid transformations that are taking place in Iraq, behind the scenes both governments are moving all the threads of the game. It is noteworthy that both governments have welcomed the results of the election declared by electronic counting. However, it seems that the frantic frenzy behind the scene of both the U.S. and Iran is to influence the process of government formation.

It could be stated that the election results are only a symptom of a larger crisis. The 2003 Iraq invasion not only destroyed the existing state machinery but failed to replace it with a sound and effective one. As the Iraqi Vice President Ayad Allawi told The National during his visit to Dubai on April 9: “Elections will not solve the crises Iraq faces unless it maintains an inclusive political process, overcomes sectarian divisions and rids itself of foreign interference.

The African proverb goes to say that when two elephants wrestle, it is only the grass on which the wrestle taking place will be harmed. Iraq looks like it has become the grass affected by the two fighting elephants: Iran and the U.S. Turkey should support Abadi or Sadr in order to form a coalition government as only a moderate Shiite group could help prevent a civil war. As with the Syrian Civil War, a civil war in Iraq will have adverse effects on Turkey.

The Iraqi parliamentary elections took place on May 12, 2018 in the shadow of the concerns shaped by the profound crises the country confronted as of 2003. Leaving the sectarian discourses that determined post-2003 Iraqi politics aside, the political parties this time made an emphasis on the Iraqi nation and went to the polls with supra-sectarian lists. The Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi’s Victory Alliance became the first party in Mosul, Moqtada al-Sadr’s Saairun coalition received a considerable vote share across the nation, and Ayad Allawi’s Al-Wataniya coalition listed both Sunni and Shia politicians. All these developments demonstrated that various political actors endeavored to address the Iraqi nation as a whole in terms of both discourse and practice.

Another matter of debate during the election process has been a question as to whether the government would be formed with a sectarian and ethnicity-based distribution of seats or with a political majority. Various circles in Iraq stressed that the presence of all the parliamentary parties in the government and the absence of an opposition blocked the political control mechanisms in the country. It was suggested that the political majority should form the government whereas those unable to enter the government should remain as opposition. Also, due to such political barriers, the corruption allegations could not be dealt with properly. Prime Minister Abadi brought the corruption allegations to the agenda and pointed out that it is time to fight against corruption following the successful anti-Daesh fight.

Another issue that was highly discussed during the election process was the relations between politics and arms. The collapse of the security sector in the country following the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, the fact that U.S. troops stayed in the country for a long time as an occupying force, the appearance of the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF, Al-Hashd Al-Sha’abi) during the anti-Daesh fight, and the presence of a separate security sector in North Iraq led to a complicated security system in Iraq. Those making an emphasis on civilian politics, especially Sadr, defended the reconstruction of the Iraqi security sector, the complete exclusion of armed units from the realm of politics, and drawing a sharp distinction between politics and arms. Various political groups and societal segments expressed their complaints over the PMF and the Fatah coalition, who has strong links to the former. In addition, the comments of Ayatollah Sistani on the political situation, who is the most influential Shia cleric in Iraq and the leading Ayatollah in Najaf, stirred a great deal of debates ahead of the parliamentary elections.

Serious objections were made to the election results beginning from the night of the election. The Iraqi Independent High Electoral Commission announced that the votes in a total of 1024 ballot boxes were cancelled on the grounds of irregularities. Meanwhile, a number of news reports stated that several political parties are preparing to issue a parliamentary motion next week for the manual recount of votes in case the electronic tallies used in the election might be faulty. The manual recount decision will be issued if 165 parliament members vote for the motion. But such a decision is quite risky as it will unsettle the atmosphere formed by the election results. Correspondingly, the head of the Independent High Electoral Commission Riyadh al-Badran issued a statement on the subject and warned that a possible intervention in the election results might drift the country into an internal conflict.

The election results displayed that the Iraqi electorate wants reform, national unity, economic development and demilitarization while refusing to get involved in the U.S.-Iran rivalry. The one making the strongest emphasis on these aspects turned out as the frontrunner of the elections, which reflects the electorate’s will in this direction. It has been seen that Sadr hastily established contacts with the actors emphasizing the abovementioned aspects, such as Ammar al-Hakim and Abadi, and gave the signals of cooperating with Sunni political coalitions including as Al-Wataniya and Muttahidoon (the Uniters for Reform Coalition) while giving a green light to the Kurdish actors such as the New Generation, Goran and Barham Salih. Such acts of Sadr showed that he is willing to meet the demands of the electorate.

Considering Sadr’s political background and his discourse and messages before and after the elections, it is seen that he wishes to shape Iraqi politics on the basis of national consensus and a reformist perspective and render the country independent from external factors. Therefore, Sadr will probably want to cooperate with the actors close to him by eliminating political actors representing the burdens of Iraq, such as sectarianism, dependence on foreign actors and corruption as much as possible. This approach of Sadr will be quite effective in the ongoing government forming process in Iraq.

The divergence of the Shia political groups that cooperated in the past and the dissolution of the Shiite bloc in the run up to the elections showed that the Shias developed different visions on the future of Iraq. Abadi and Nouri al-Maliki, two figures from Iraq’s Dawa Party, ran for the elections on two different lists, whereas the PMF gathered the electorate from many political groups including the bases of Abadi, Maliki and Hakim and a divergence has been observed between Hakim and the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq. These are some of the examples portraying the divergence of Shia groups. Also, the rivalries between Sadr and Maliki; Hadi Al-Amiri and Hakim; and Abadi and Maliki demonstrate the growing dissent. The spiritual leadership Sistani represents seeks to play a conciliatory role by avoiding to become a party to any side, but he does not refrain from taking a stance against crucial issues such as corruption. Alternative opinions regarding the relation between religion and politics that do not cohere with orthodox Shiism began to spread among the youth while the separation of religion and politics started to be articulated more frequently and vocally.

The number of minor and local groups increased after the dissolution of Sunni groups and some of them ran for the elections in the lists of Abadi and Fatah, which revealed that the Shia political actors in control of government bodies achieved to win the Sunnis over and the Sunni political elites failed to meet the demands of the Sunni electorate. Furthermore, it has been frequently expressed in field that the presence of the PMF in Sunni regions has a strong influence on the behaviors of the Sunni electorate and elite and negatively affected the political representation of the Sunni will. Another significant issue that needs to be addressed is the question as to whether the ballots reflect the will of the Sunnis subject to domestic migration to different parts of Iraq due to the Daesh threat. The reflection of the Sunni people’s will on politics and whether they would receive the share they demanded from the Baghdad administration will continue to be among the primary issues of Iraqi politics.

More, it has been observed that there is not any significant divergence in Kurdish politics. The Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), who are the two leading actors of Kurdish politics, maintain their influence. There has been a decrease in parliamentary seats occupied by Goran and Islamic parties. It has been revealed that new political movements, such as the coalitions founded by Shahsuvar Abdulvahit and Barham Salih, enjoyed a voter support that suffices to carry them through. Despite that, it has been another point of discussion whether the Kurdish electorate found what they expected from Kurdish politics. The developments in the upcoming days will shed light on a number of issues including how the tensions in the Arbil-Baghdad line could be restored following the illegal referendum and the profound economic crisis suffered by North Iraq and how the internal balances in North Iraq will reflect on the relations with Baghdad. The attitude of the Iraqi Kurds during the government formation process will also be a major determinant in Iraqi politics.

The new political portrait that has emerged as a result of the interaction between politicians and the electorate for the past 15 years is not the sole factor reflecting the trajectory of Iraqi politics since Iraq is the leading country affected by the U.S.-Iran tension. In the following period, the character of the tension between Iran and the U.S. will shape both actors’ Iraq policies and determine the features they are looking for in their alliances in Iraq. The rising tension between these countries will negatively influence the voter-politician interaction in Iraq and the possibility of reconciliation in Iraq will increase in the contrary case. Therefore, the future of Iraq also depends on global and regional balances alongside the country’s internal dynamics, and the new government will be formed on this basis.

U.S. regional allies, the Israel-Gulf bloc’s demands toward breaking Iran’s regional influence and the rigidity of U.S. President Trump’s steps to that end will determine the rigidity of Iran’s counter maneuvers. If confronted with harsh steps, Iran will attempt to use its influence on Iraq to break the pressure on itself. While the U.S. will prefer actors in Iraq that will leave Iraq out of this tension by narrowing Iran’s sphere of influence, Iran will prefer actors that will act in its favor. As in the past 15 years, Turkey will prefer to play a balancing role to help Iraq overcome such tensions with minimum damage. In addition to this, Turkey will take on active roles in solving the water problem in Iraq, cooperation in counter-terror fight and the reconstruction of Iraq – displaying a policy rather different from those engaging in power struggle by proxy.

In a nutshell, the atmosphere prevailing after the Iraqi parliamentary elections showed the changing nature of Iraqi politics. A considerable part of the Iraqi electorate demands the solution of the country’s chronic problems, normalization of daily life and wants domestic politics to get over sectarian and ethnicity-based polarizations whilst another part still carries the burden introduced with post-2003 Iraq. In Iraqi politics, local dynamics are not the sole determinants as the U.S.-Iran conflict also has negative effects on the country. This conflict will be visible in the government formation process of Iraq and will continue to negatively affect the future of the country. On the other hand, the balancing role played by several countries in the region such as Turkey is making positive contributions to the relief of Iraqi people.

The initial outcomes of the ongoing negotiations on pre-electoral alliance between the Felicity Party and the Iyi Party was revealed last weak. The vice chairman of the Iyi Party announced that both parties had agreed on forming an alliance on principal and that the Democrat Party will also join this alliance. As stated in the declaration coming from the Iyi Party, the content and method of this alliance is not clearly defined yet. Nonetheless, it is certain that these parties are going to form an alliance in the second run of the presidential elections if no candidate wins a simple majority (50%+1 vote) in the first round. The vice chairman of the Iyi Party rationalized this strategy by giving the example of Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu who was nominated as the candidate for presidency by the CHP and MHP alliance in the 2014 presidential elections. The failure of Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu in that election was taken as a reference point by the Felicity Party and Iyi Party to failure of pre-electoral alliance in the first round. Thus, the first significant strategy for these parties in forming an alliance appeared as the second run-based formulation.

Issues, principles or ideology?

Another striking point of this unripe alliance is the emphasis on ambiguous principals which are not publicly declared. Both parties explained that this alliance is going to be established on principals that both parties agreed on. Nevertheless, the extent and limitations of these principles were not defined. Whether the core of these principles are going to be a set of values or an ideology was not expressed by the parties. On the contrary, the AK Party-MHP alliance introduced the core of their alliance as the value of national unity, which would be open to each party respectful of the country’s national values, unity and solidarity. The AK Party and MHP also emphasized that parties willing to join this alliance had to respect these values. When it comes to the Iyi Party-Felicity Party-Democrat Party alliance, there is still no issue, principle, or value on surface in terms of forming the alliance. Because of this reason, the alliance has been criticized by some circles as being so latent.

In this point, another striking question comes to the forefront: why have these parties accelerated their efforts to form an alliance even when they are not ready yet? Actually, it is obvious that the clear-cut formulation of the AK Party-MHP alliance forced other parties in the system to take their positions about forming an alliance. Even if these parties are not ready to form an alliance in related to the ambiguity of their interests, they took measures to not drop out of the race towards the 2019 elections.

Indeed, it is possible to have a discussion on the issue of ideological proximity between these parties in the following days. It is related to the fact that the ideological proximity between the parties to form an alliance will be effective in determining the components of the alliance and its success or failure. Since there is a mismatch between the ideologies of the Iyi Party-Felicity Party-Democrat Party triumvirate, it will be difficult especially in parliamentary elections for these parties to form alliances and hold their voters. Additionally, the CHP is expected to continue its search for alliance until the elections, which will also determine the boundaries of the Iyi Party-Felicity Party-Democrat Party alliance.

It is obvious that the opposition parties still lack in a consensus on pre-electoral alliances. The problems are mostly related to the problem of ideological distance between aforementioned parties and the fuzziness of their interests in joining an alliance.

In presidential systems, electoral alliances are held in both presidential and parliamentary elections. The presidential authority, which holds executive power, has vital importance for political parties. For this reason, parties – whose primary aim is to obtain this position – tend to form an alliance if they cannot get a majority of the votes. Thus, the concept of majority rule in presidential elections make alliances an obligation for countries governed by a presidential system.

The presence of an organic link between presidential elections and parliamentary elections in presidential systems ensures that alliances formed at one election are carried out at the other. For this reason, the general tendency in countries governed by presidential systems is providing alliance both in the presidential and parliamentary elections. In other words, the scope of alliances in presidential and parliamentary elections is interdependent, and the success achieved in one election seems to influence the results of the other.

Since the main actor in the presidential system is the president, the success of this candidate in elections also determines the success of its party in parliament. Called the coattail effect in political science literature, this implies that the presidential candidate’s popularity and electoral success contributes to the success of their party in parliamentary and local elections. This is the case especially when presidential and legislative elections are held at the same time.If there is a significant time difference between the presidency and legislative elections, this effect decreases. The period between the two elections is also another important determinant in the success of alliances.

Another consequence of the coattail effect in terms of electoral alliances concerns minor parties and their election strategies. If the presidential and legislative elections areheld synchronically, the chances of the presidential candidates of minor parties to win the election are reduced. This is because their candidates cannot create a massive effect on society due to their limited popularity. Therefore, these minor parties have a tendency to form alliances with larger parties in order to obtain significant success in elections.

Another element determinant on pre-electoral alliances in presidential systems is the intrinsic political culture of countries. As an extension of this culture, electoral alliances have changing characteristics. For example, in Mexico, alliances have been more common in the last twenty years due to rising political instability following the end of dominant party rule. In related to the effects of instability of the political system, Brazil has very well framed pre-electoral alliance rules in its Election and Political Party Laws. In South Korea, the effects of long-lasting military regimes and strong leadership factors brought about leadership-based pre-electoral alliances formed with the initiation and mutual confidence of the leaders of the parties. As a semi-presidential system, France has witnessed a clear-cut division among political parties on both sides of the spectrum. Parties on the left and right have formed alliances within themselves.

Last but not least, the balance of power among parties forming a pre-electoral alliance is a crucial element. This balance is shaped by their power as a unique actor. Each party in the alliance can contribute to the election success in accordance with its popularity among the general public. At this point, if a party fails to convince its voters that it has achieved necessary gains from an alliance, the party may be negatively affected. For this reason, political parties pay close attention to their achievements and contributions when forming an alliance and observe whether there is any deviance is the balance of power between the two parties.

If the referendum on the presidential system in Turkey was a close call for “no,” for instance with 50.1% of the total votes, no one in this world would question its legitimacy. It would have been deemed as a tremendous victory of the anti-Erdoğan wing. It didn’t come to pass and the bill passed the referendum with 51.4%. Then, it must be Erdoğan’s triumph! President Erdoğan received the public support by acquiring 1,300,000 more votes than “no” in a referendum which was attended by 86.4% of the eligible voters. Kurdish votes showing 10-20% increase in certain cities played an important role in Erdoğan’s victory,  who has been at the helm of the government for 15 years, first as the prime minister and then as the president.

A Turkey which is surrounded by wars, hosts 2,500,000 Syrian refugees, has been targeted by both Daesh and the PKK, recently overcame a coup attempt on July 15 Gülenist infiltrators instructed by Fetullah Gülen who tried to move the country into an unprecedented chaos. Considering the reactions of especially the US universities and think-tanks, along with some Europeans ones, there is a president who is being condemned for “surviving the coup attempt.”

A president who has been more eager than his predecessors in making Turkey a full member of the EU, who has recognized the Kurdish problem and commenced the reconciliation process, who has realized education reforms for thousands of women that were forcibly thrown out by the police and forced to leave their schools just because they were wearing headscarves, and who extended his condolences to Armenians on April 24 and asked for an international commission to research what has transpired during 1915 incidents… A president who embraced the doorkeeper of the hotel he was staying in Brussels, along with the German Chancellor Schröder, who calls and talks with his childhood friends, who has earned the love and interest of the people… The most significant political leader since Atatürk.

It has become ambiguous when it did happen; however, the said president started to be compared to the cruelest man of the last century, Hitler, deemed as a dictator and alleged for massacring Kurds with an elaborate perception management that was devised by the West. In a short time the anti-Erdoğan club became quite cosmopolitan: even Daesh leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, PKK, Gülen and his henchmen became the members of it. A fabulous cosmopolitan coalition of opposition! It should be mentioned that this coalition inevitably brought quite a support to Erdoğan and affected the result of referendum in a positive way.

Talking about Turkey, there are a few members of the opposition who voted “no” and constantly criticize as they want the system to become more democratic and have a robust judicial system. Nevertheless, whatever be the discussion, the “no” movement has always been spearheaded by the main opposition party CHP which comes from a Kemalist tradition. Justice and Development Party (AK Party) which has been governing Turkey for 15 years, has proposed numerous proposals about changing the 1982 constitution that was implemented by the junta.

The main opposition party opposed all of these proposals. This wasn’t surprising, as this is the nature of the Kemalist opposition parties. However, what is surprising is that the opposition party has never proposed a change or an alternative to the 1982 constitution, the same constitution that the all people in Turkey unanimously want to change. Let alone preparing a proposal that could worry AK Party, they haven’t even scribbled a draft of a constitution. Indeed, for 15 years AK Party and its leader Tayyip Erdoğan have been always challenging their own records in elections and broke them with unprecedented figures.

Erdoğan and his party that don’t have to worry about a legitimate opposition have overcome numerous illegitimate attempts aiming to depose them. The referendum was held under the conditions of the state of emergency that was declared right after the July 15 coup attempt. The subject matter was a change in the system of government; however, this wasn’t being voted in the referendum. It was between those who are against Erdoğan, both in Turkey and the world, and those who stood with Erdoğan.

Despite the campaigning since February, almost none of the voters regardless of their point of view are aware of either the so-called parliamentary system that grants excessive authority to the president or the presidential system which is different than the existing system. Among those who are aware, the objections of the main opposition party’s voters were not taken much into consideration as they refrained from criticizing the existing odd system and, moreover, as they were the ones that made it stranger. On the other hand, even though the AK Party voters were concerned about certain things, the “yes” won because of the trust in Erdoğan.

Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) which allied with AK Party for the referendum failed to garner the expected support. However, the Kurdish votes played a decisive role in the referendum by increasing support for “yes” in 14 cities located in Eastern and Southeastern Anatolia. Considering the vote AK Party garnered in November 1 elections in 2015, there is a varying increase between 10% and 20% in cities in Eastern and Southeastern Anatolia. The concerns for security, believing Erdoğan will resolve issues of the region and the reaction against PKK’s trench and urban warfare contributed to the victory. Moreover, there were those who voted “yes” as they believed that 1982 constitution is indefensible and it is impossible to resolve the Kurdish problem with the existing parliamentary system. For this reason, Erdoğan was able to increase its votes in Diyarbakır from 22.2% to 32.43%, in Batman from 30% to 36.48%, in Mardin from 30% to 40.96%, in Siirt from 40% to 48.1%, in Şırnak from 13% to 28.41%, and in Şanlıurfa from 67.8% to 70.82%.

As a result, it could be said that Erdoğan who is the indubitably the most prominent political figure of Turkey for 15 years has received less votes than his potential. However, the precedents of Turkish political history and sociology, along with the experience, show that Erdoğan will be able to maintain his government. Even if the transition to presidential system wasn’t realized, he still would be a powerful president due to the provisions of the constitution, along with being elected president in the first round with 51.8% of the votes. He himself was powerful before; now, his seat is also powerful.

A small portion of the AK Party voters abstained from voting “yes” not because of a concern about Erdoğan, but because they weren’t sure of the answer to the following question: “what will happen after Erdoğan?” Erdoğan, who will become the leader of his party due to the constitutional change, will probably take some steps that will answers the expectations and concerns of his voters, while also taking the Kurdish voters’ support into consideration. It is also highly probable that the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) which is perceived as the only representative of Kurdish politics by the international community will face new rivaling competitors in the region, beside their only rival AK Party.

This must be the post-truth world. It seems to have started with Trump… He became the President of the US with a discourse against the global system, the same system Trump himself owes his wealth and power. Even the UK, the founding father of the liberal-capitalist system that is currently dominating the globe, is an opponent of the system! They have left a certain system with Brexit, after all. From now on, it seems that the politicians of the Western democracies addressing the public will try to prove that they are the opponents of the system and establishment.

This is indeed the buzzword of the French presidential elections. There isn’t even one candidate who is a proponent of the system! While all of the candidates claim that they are against it, each and every one of them accuses the others of being a proponent of the system. Looking at what each of them said, you can understand what they mean while talking about the system and what they are against. Otherwise, being just an opponent of the system is nothing but ambiguous. The discourses of Trump and the presidential candidates in France reveal that being against the system in Western democracies primarily means being against immigration with a hint of critique of globalization. A hollow and magical word which was created against the masses that shouldered the burden of 2008 financial crises and were desperate in the face of global capitalist system and technology! Moreover, the French have been governed by two contrasting figures, Hollande and Sarkozy, in the last 10 years and there were no differences, no changes. As change has lost its meaning, the experts of  political marketing provided a new product: being against the system.

Look at the left; firstly to Emmanuel Macron who seems to be leading the polls. ENA graduate, former employee of Rothschild Bank, never elected before, became the Minister of Economy of the Socialist Government by the will of President Hollande and garnered the support of the capitalists; yet, he is against the system. Isn’t that a bit odd? A student at Colombia University asked the “centrist” Emmanuel Macron whether he was anti-system. “It’s not enough to just claim that; we should observe how the system reacted to my candidacy. The establishment wanted to destroy me when I became a candidate,” he replied. Establishment, for Macron, is the Socialist Party, which didn’t support his candidacy and conducted a pre-selection process.

On the other hand, Socialist Party candidate Benoit Hamon, who is a proponent of the welfare state and has a pluralist rhetoric, says that he doesn’t want to maintain the system. Still, like Macron, he also served as a minister for more than two years in the current government. The third candidate on the left, former Trotskyist and senator, member of the Socialist Party since 1970, and a member of the European Parliament Jean-Luc Mélenchon is also against the system. He said “people are rejecting those who advocate the system that condemned them to death” and, turning towards the members of the press, added: “For instance, you are the system!”

The right-wing candidate François Fillon is also against the system! “My project will disrupt the order of those who benefit from the system,” he said. Fillon was the prime minister of the former French president Sarkozy. At first, it was revealed that Fillon made one of his businessman friends “gift” him three suits, each of them costing €13,000, while making another friend gift him two luxury watches. Then, it was found out that he had invented an imaginary job for his wife in the parliament, costing the taxpayers €800,000 over 30 years, and similarly “employing” his daughter and son for some years. He is now furious at the media, saying that it’s not the media that is to determine the next president.

What the system means for the far-right’s candidate and a member of the European Parliament Marine Le Pen is everything that stands against her party Front National, of course! Her promises offer more radical and structural reforms when compared to other candidates, that’s for sure. However, at this point, certain discourses which would be deemed scandalous a couple of years ago are now being uttered by politicians and intellectuals of both the classical right and left. It has become commonplace. Indeed, the Islamophobic approaches that were commenced over the burkini and headscarf, along with the anti-immigrant discourse, increased the power of Le Pen.

When her father Jean Marie Le Pen eliminated Socialist Party candidate Lionel Jospin in the first round and got to the runoff together with Chirac in 2002, this was a catastrophe for France. The father Le Pen had garnered 16.8% and 17.19% of the votes in the first and second rounds, respectively. According to the famous IFOP polls, today Marine Le Pen is expected to garner 22.5% of the total votes in the first round. Moreover, according to the same poll, this figure is only one point lower than Macron who seems to be leading the first round. Le Pen is ahead of Fillon (19.5%), Mélenchon (18.5%) and Hamon (7.5%), nevertheless. In a possible runoff, she may acquire twice the votes her father could in 2002. In a climate where the views of the far-right crept into both sides of the political spectrum and became normalized, Marine Le Pen who is deemed to be more moderate than her father is now a part of the system, not an outsider. Or, at least, it could be said that she has drawn the others into her system.

Le Pen’s most significant competitor Emmanuel Macron made a U-turn from his initial position at the very beginning of the election and, referring to Angela Merkel’s (in)famous statement, said “France is not a multicultural country.” When the Canadian prime minister was shown as an example on immigration, he said “I don’t agree with him. I would be much more authoritative in this issue.” Previously, these kinds of approaches would be perceived as something negative; now, it is not like that, not even a bit. Seeing that her rivals are using her discourses, Marine Le Pen felt the need to kick it up a notch and make the most assertive statement in the world: “During my presidency, there will never be a terrorist attack like those happened in Bataclan and Stade de France.” Considering all, the only candidate who seems to be an outsider to the system is the Socalist Party candidate Hamon. He was able to outmaneuver former Prime Minister Manuelle Valls who is known for Islamophobic remarks with votes from the suburbs in the pre-selection; however, he could not garner the same success in the campaign process.

While Jean Marie Le Pen wasn’t even allowed on TV, her daughter demanded the removal of the EU flag at the studio set as a precondition to her appearance on France’s most known TV channel TF1. Anti-EU sentiments were once an original discourse of her father; now, they are not. Both Le Pen and Mélenchon are promising to have a Frexit, making France, one of the two original founders of the EU, leave the international organization. It’s an interesting sight to behold; a politician of the far-right and a leftist are promising the same about the EU and we have precedence with Brexit. While they don’t want to exit the EU, Fillon is talking about the renegotiation of Schengen and Hamon is discussing that treaties should be revised. Therefore, it’s not easy to claim to be against the system and showing your difference.

If the predictions of the research companies are true and Le Pen is able to get to the runoff in France where a fourth of the voters are indecisive, Le Pen’s opponent will be elected president! For now, her most vigorous adversary is Macron; if this comes to pass, for the first time in the history of the Fifth Republic the largest political formations of the country, the Socialist Party and the Republicans, will be eliminated. He may become the president without being backed by a party, almost like Trump, and only by the support of the capitalists and political marketing. The vote he is to receive in the first round will be only a memory for him in the Elysée Palace.