AKP’s candidate roster

TURKEY - In Brief 15 Apr 2015 by Atilla Yesilada

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After an 8 day London trip, during which I and my side-kick Cosmic Strategist visited up to 40 members of the investment banking community, I’m back in Turkey, having missed a Weekly and the most important event of the recent past, namely the submission of candidate rosters to the High Election Board. Thanks to an interested reader, whose name shall remain secret, who posted a question to GSP website, I can kill two birds with one stone; i.e. comment on candidate rosters and the potential for a post-election rift between Erdogan and Davutoglu. The question is as follows: “Should we see AKP doing poorly in the upcoming election, what is the likelihood of an intra-AKP infighting in which PM Davutoglu shows a stronger hand? Would Davutoglu be able/willing to challenge the president's leadership of the party? Would such an event be seen positively by the investors you talk to? Would it entail return to economic orthodoxy in your mind?” Clearly, if Davutoglu had made up the candidate roster he would have a much stronger hand to challenge Erdogan in my base case (50% likelihood) election scenario, where pro-Kurdish HDP makes it to the parliament and AKP produces at best 300 seats, thus Erdogan falling short of the majority to drive home his executive presidency amendment to the Constitution. (By the way, no new polls in my absence, but wide fears in the market that my base case scenario is becoming the most realistic, judging by the local investment bank reporting). According to my archive survey, neither Erdogan nor Davutoglu had exclusive control of the roster. Davutoglu led the process at the head of an inter-party committee but “the president was extensively consulted in...