Toppling the president and his AKP party in May is no longer unthinkable. But voters in Ankara seem finely balanced
On the outskirts of the Turkish capital in a contested electoral district, two young voters tussled over the approaching election in a dessert shop, the smell of sugar and hot butter wafting through the air. Iflah Oluklu, a skinny 23-year-old with bleached hair, black jeans and a fitted black T-shirt, chastised his friend for disrespecting some supporters of the Turkish president while they were playing an online video game.
The two friends are split in their allegiances. Oluklu described himself as a nationalist, and said he intended to support Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in a tightly contested presidential election on 14 May. “Erdoğan is like a father figure for us in Turkey. He’s been running the country for 20 years. I don’t think it’s impossible to remove him as leader, but especially among this opposition, there’s no one who can replace him,” he said.
