Those awaiting the election cannot emerge from the ballot box

Yaşar Aydın In all the speeches by Erdoğan, Bahçeli, Öcalan, Kılıçdaroğlu, Trump and Tom Barrack, the new era was defined in a similar way. Turkey is part of the Middle Eastern region. It must be part of the coalition formed by the US on the basis of religious and ethnic identities.

Turkey’s regime must be reorganised to bring it into line with this order. The outcome of this process is already clearly visible today. We are in the midst of a process where the will of the people is deemed unnecessary, where the preferences of ethnic and religious opinion leaders are deemed sufficient, and where the electoral law will be amended accordingly.

Let us call a spade a spade: the door has been opened to a new era in which elections and ballot boxes are merely symbolic. ÜSKÜDAR: THE TURNING POINT The regime’s total public support has fallen below 30 per cent. It is highly unlikely that this situation will change any time soon.

On the table of the MHP and AKP are plans to find a way to remain in power without the voter base changing. The peace process and sidelining Kurdish politics are part of this. Even if this were to proceed smoothly, it is not seen as a guaranteed path to power.

We can already see that their agenda includes steps that will strain or even disregard the constitution, electoral law and rules of political ethics. The manner in which Üsküdar Municipality was taken over has served as a preview of the days to come. The whole country witnessed how the governor, the public prosecutor, the police and worked in concert to flout every law.

It was not merely an operation that was carried out, nor was it merely a transfer of personnel, nor was it merely the judiciary being brought into play, nor was it merely the bureaucracy working for the AKP. All of them moved simultaneously towards the same objective. Every democratic rule accumulated since the Republic’s transition to a multi-party system has been swept away in an instant.

There is no doubt that this process has been managed from a single centre from the very beginning. The main hub of the process is clear. AKP President Erdoğan, whilst monitoring the transfer of the district where he resides to the AKP, also sent a message to Turkey’s 86 million people via Üsküdar: ‘You have no choice but to follow us!’ THIS OPPOSITION IS NOT ENOUGH What is happening in Üsküdar comes as no surprise.

The regime has been preparing for this process for almost two years. It has been trying to accustom the country to a period of constant coups under a state of emergency. Every move paves the way for the next.

Throughout this process, everything that was once deemed ‘unthinkable’ for Turkey has been implemented one by one. As Özgür Özel put it, even Istanbul, with its 16 million inhabitants, could change hands. It is abundantly clear that the regime has no intention of allowing ‘minor details’ such as the Constitutional Court, the European Court of Human Rights or electoral law to stand in its way.

It is quite evident that it will simply bypass them. The critical question here is how the opposition forces will respond to this. Will they dismiss it as just another routine process with a press statement, or will they act in a manner befitting the gravity of the situation?

Will they allow the agenda to be shaped around issues such as the peace process, the annulment case, and figures like Kılıçdaroğlu, Davutoğlu and Gökçek, rather than organising themselves around the people’s demands? The performance demonstrated so far by all opposition forces, both inside and outside Parliament, has shown that it is insufficient to thwart the regime’s plan. The Üsküdar incident, meanwhile, serves as a serious warning that even tougher days lie ahead.

The opposition has been unable to rise above its usual pace and break its habits in the face of the state of emergency conditions created by the regime. It appears essential that, as a whole, they recognise the danger and step up their efforts. THE PEOPLE MUST STEP IN No single individual or party stands a chance of resisting the regime’s attempts to consolidate its power on its own.

In this bleak landscape, where the ballot box and elections are being reduced to a mere symbolic endorsement and the rule of law has been suspended, the only way out is for the true holders of sovereignty, the people, to step directly onto the stage. The opposition’s approach, which confines politics to election timetables and attempts to play by the rules set by the regime, cannot halt this course of events. This reality has been confirmed once again by the events in Üsküdar.

There is now a need for a genuine social objection that will be woven together neighbourhood by neighbourhood, street by street, workplace by workplace, and rise from the grassroots upwards. It is a vital necessity for the people to break free from the mere mould of a passive ‘voter’ and, with an active sense of citizenship, to take practical ownership of their own will, their labour and the future of their country. In a game where the rules are entirely designed by the regime, and where the judiciary and law enforcement act as mere party apparatuses, it is impossible to win by simply waiting for one’s turn.

As we emphasised at the outset: those who remain inactive and merely wait for the election will not emerge victorious from the ballot box. The sole force capable of rescuing Turkey from this stranglehold into which it has been drawn, and of building a democratic country, is that unshakeable social will which millions will mobilise by standing shoulder to shoulder to take their destiny into their own hands. Note: This article is translated from the original article titled Seçimi bekleyen sandıktan çıkamaz, published in BirGün newspaper on September 9, 2026.