In Trabzon, redrawn city boundaries may dash opposition hopes

 TRABZON

It could be the single issue on which all political parties in Turkey agree. Local elections slated for March 30^th will be a  referendum on Prime Minister Tayyip Erdoğan’s decade-plus tenure in power.
 
Opposition figures are predicting an electoral bruising, insisting that public anger continues to  grow over corruption allegations, heavy-handed police tactics, and a recent trio of democracy-snubbing laws.
 
But while those issues may affect the results in Turkey's largest, protest-rocked cities, a tour of Turkey's rural provinces shows that not all local politics are national.
 
This past week, P24 took to the campaign trail on Turkey's Black Sea coast, speaking to politicians in the provinces of Rize, Trabzon, Giresun and Ordu.
 
In this conservative, nationalist heartland, “it's best for us to avoid corruption,” said Kerim Aksu, Giresun mayor of the Republican People's Party (CHP). “People here embrace the Prime Minister. You can win votes on promising a new road, not by arguing over national troubles,” he confessed to us over a late-night rakı.
 
To understand the outcome of this month's elections, Aksu and other Black Sea candidates point to the labyrinth of local politics, chiefly urban development, electoral redistricting, and a candidate’s appetite for baby kissing.

 
Trabzon: A port town 'up for grabs' 
It's morning in the port city of Trabzon, where tangled bouquets of election flags hang heavy over traffic-clogged streets. The fire department has taken to cutting down on the clutter, but somehow most of the flags and banners they remove belong to the Turkey's opposition Republican People's Party (CHP).
 
Even so, the CHP hopes to unseat the incumbent Justice and Development Party (AKP) mayor later this month, reversing the ruling party's 2009 victory of 48 percent over the CHP's 41 percent.
 
“In Trabzon, we know it can be done. There's a 30 percent swing vote we're going to use,” insisted Former mayor and CHP candidate, Volkan Canalioğlu. “Nobody can ever hold on to Trabzon. Why? Because nobody can keep citizens here happy enough to remain in power!” laughed 63-year old mayoral hopeful.

 
Corruption is not the issue and criticising the PM carries risks 
Canalioğlu cites a long register of now defunct conservative-right parties that once governed Trabzon, a who’s-no-longer list of politician who took the blame for the city's two largest, intractable problems: decades of shoddy investment and an unemployment rate which has sent two generations of youth packing for Istanbul, Ankara, or Germany.
 
“Compared to these issues, corruption is a distant thing,” Canalioğlu said. “To be sure, people are talking about it in their homes, they're asking, is this true?” On the campaign trail, Trabzon's CHP has only mentioned the three-month old scandal indirectly. “Criticizing Erdoğan is difficult. People are quite sensitive about the prime minister here,” said Canalioğlu.
 
 
An electoral game-changer: Trabzon's borders redrawn 
But even if Canalioğlu does win votes from the scandal, his campaign is likely doomed by another, little discussed factor in the coming elections. In 2012, parliament passed a law reclassifying Trabzon and 12 other provinces as “metropolitan municipalities,” a measure that turns rural villages into neighbourhoods of the provincial capital. These rural voters – who have overwhelmingly favoured AKP during the last decade – are likely to increase the government party’s chances.
 
Fevzi Gümrükçüoğlu, Trabzon's ruling party mayor, was candid about the change. “At this stage, we are very confident,” the 62-year old said, diminutive and soft-spoken behind his sprawling mayor's desk. “Even if there's an alliance between the CHP and MHP, behind one candidate, they wouldn't have enough support to make us lose.”
 
Canalioğlu also conceded that the law had dramatically redefined the election. It might make the election look more like 2009's region-wide elections for the provincial council, when 260,000 voters cast ballots for AKP, just 80,000 for CHP, and 68,000 MHP. “We know that an alliance with the MHP won't be enough,” admitted Canalioğlu. “We need to get swing voters. We are trying to make this election about the candidate, not the party.”
 

Punch-up at Berkin Elvan protest 
If recent scandals over corruption and police violence have created a voter backlash in Trabzon, it is hard to see. On the day 15-year old Berkin Elvan died in an Istanbul hospital from injuries sustained during last summer's anti-government demonstrations, a crowd of a few hundred gathered in Trabzon's central park. Berkin's death, after a coma that lasted 270 days– saw protesters take to the streets in nearly every Turkish city. But in Trabzon, the protest seemed to win scorn, not sympathy from onlookers.
 
One observer surged into the crowd, throwing punches at bewildered demonstrators.
 
“They're paid to do this,” said another passerby. “These are children being led like sheep by radicals. They don't even know what they're protesting about.”

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