AK Party Who Has Betrayed Gaza Suffered a Big Loss in the Local Elections

News:

In the March 31 local elections, the People's Alliance, which includes the AK Party and the Nationalist Movement Party, suffered a big loss. In the March 31 local elections held in the shadow of the massacre in Gaza and the economic crisis in Turkey, the CHP that won 35 municipalities, 14 of which were metropolitan municipalities, became the party with the highest number of votes across Turkey. While the AK Party fell to 2nd place for the first time, the decrease in the voter turnout rate was also remarkable. (Agencies, 03.04.2024)

Comment:

Another electoral process has been left behind, in which the democracy of the West always wins in the end, regardless of its qualification. For months, the Turkish public has been preoccupied with the March 31 local elections. Almost since the beginning of 2024, these elections have been the only main agenda of the public. The open and secret electoral alliances between political parties, the bargaining negotiations, the discussions and fights during the nomination of candidates and the shameful scenes that emerged during the propaganda process showed once again the ugly face of democratic elections, which sees every path as permissible for self-interest.

With the presidential elections held in May last year, the February 6 earthquake, the wreckages, the destructions, the cries, the migrations and the losses were covered up. In the March 31 local elections, on the other hand, they tried to make us forget Gaza, they tried to cover up the economic crisis, they ignored the inflation and the cost of living. Especially media outlets, journalists, writers, troll armies and even some scholars were preoccupied with the interests of parties, leaders and politicians, rather than the affairs of Muslims. They called Muslims to the ballot box with a "worship consciousness" so to say, by saying that 30 years of so-called gains should not be wasted and the march should not stop.

But this time the calculations did not work out. To the 8 million 886 thousand people who did not go to the ballot box in the 2019 local elections, 4 million 358 thousand more people were added in these elections and approximately 13.5 million people did not go to the ballot box. According to the government and many survey companies, the majority of those who did not participate in the elections were AK Party supporters. Although no one wants to bring it up, there is no doubt that the most important reason for this intellectual rupture in the ruling base is the abandonment of Gaza and the brazen and shameless continuation of trade with the Jewish entity at the expense of betraying Palestine.

Therefore, the Islamophobic Kemalist CHP did not win the elections, the AK Party, which had been in power for 22 years, lost, the political party that had held almost all of the metropolitan municipalities in Turkey for 30 years lost. A great anger and reaction to the government came out of the ballot box. Out of the ballot box came a reaction not only to the government, but also to the capitalist outdated system that does nothing good for Muslims, tyrannizes over the oppressed and protects the oppressor, does not protect the rights of the poor, and feeds the rich and capital more. There was a shocking reaction to the arrogant politicians who scorn and despise the people, to the leaders who are drunk with power and do not see the situation of the workers, pensioners and the poor from their luxurious and comfortable spaces, to the mentality that considers waste and gaudiness as prestige and is a slave to rent, interest and money.

An important message was given to the conservative parties and their leaders who prioritize Western values despite the Anatolian people, who cherish the Kemalist identity of the secularists instead of the Islamic identity of the Muslims, and who try to be more Kemalist than the secularists by feeling inferiority complex that blesses the Republic more than them. Most importantly, while Gaza was dying, while Gaza was being completely destroyed, while the people of Gaza were being subjected to genocide, reaction was shown to the soulless candidates who made entertainment programs with songs at rally squares.

In sum, the election results show that the people have sent the following message to the government: "If you do not protect the rights and the law, if you turn away from justice, if you protect the rich and not the poor, if you abandon the workers and pensioners, if you go after rent and interests, I will do what is necessary. If you remain insensitive to Gaza, if you do not take steps for Gaza, and if you continue to trade with murderers, we will ask you to pay for it at the ballot box. If you do not think about the lives of Gazan children, but about the money and profits of the companies, we will vote you out of office."

But will the government and its supporters learn from this defeat and turn their faces back to Islam and Muslims?

Apparently, they won't. Because they again say that the superstitious democracy has won. They unashamedly say that they will continue to work in line with Mustafa Kemal's goals. They listen to America; they wait for the words of the US president regarding Gaza and other issues of the Ummah. Because they are their masters, because they are the ones who put them in office when they want and take them down when they want. Therefore, neither the democratic system nor its elections have benefited Muslims, nor will they benefit them.

Each and every Muslim must work for the re-establishment of the Khilafah (Caliphate) upon the method of the Prophethood, which is Islam's form of government. Because the Khilafah will unite the individual, the society and the state around the same idea and the same goal, and will liberate Palestine and all our oppressed lands, and will rule with justice among people, and will bring the Muslim Ummah to the summit it deserves.

Written for the Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir by
Muhammed Emin Yıldırım