Would You Support a Non-Partisan Candidate in The Presidential Elections?
Would You Support a Non-Partisan Candidate in The Presidential Elections?
Turkiye Raporu
April, 2022
Presidential elections are approaching. Although a definite date for the election has not been given yet, eyes are on the Nation Alliance. The opposition candidate that will face Recep Tayyip Erdogan seems to determine the fate of the election. In particular, the names of Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, Meral Akşener, Ekrem İmamoğlu and Mansur Yavaş were mentioned as possible candidates in this process. While it remains a matter of curiosity who will be the opposition candidate, we conducted a research on the four names that were talked about as candidates for the Presidency for the February 2nd issue of the Turkey Report. According to the results of the survey, it is seen that Mansur Yavaş is the strongest candidate from these four names against Erdoğan in the second round. In the scenario where Yavaş is a candidate, it is seen that he surpasses Erdoğan at a significant rate of 16%, while in the case of Kılıçdaroğlu’s candidacy, this rate drops to 2%.
However, it is known that the opposition may also put forward a non-political name for the presidential candidate. It is even said that the opposition determined the candidate, but concealed it in order to prevent the name from being worn out. To give an example of a non-political candidate, the CHP and MHP had recently chosen Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu as a joint candidate. Although the candidate created dissatisfaction with some opposition voters, İhsanoğlu received 38% of the countrywide votes in the 2014 Presidential elections. In this context, we ask, “Would you support a non-partisan candidate in the presidential elections?” We asked the question and investigated whether our participants were willing to vote for a non-political candidate in the upcoming Presidential elections. We analyzed the answers by breaking them down according to gender, age, education and political party.
When we examine the general results, we see that 67% of our participants are/may be willing to support a non-political candidate in the Presidential elections. While 26% say “Yes, I would”, 41% say they may vote for a non-political candidate depending on who the candidate is.
However, some think that a non-political candidate should not be President: 34% of our respondents stated that they would not support a non-political candidate in the Presidential elections.
Compared to women, men are more willing to vote for a non-political candidate in the Presidential elections. 30% of male participants said “Yes, I would.” this rate drops to 22% for women. On the other hand, female participants also say that depending on who the candidate is, they may be willing to vote for a non-political candidate in the Presidential election: 43% say they may give support based on who the candidate is, while this rate is 37% for male participants.
According to the age breakdown, especially the 25-34 age group, with 39%, was the group that most frequently stated that they would not support a non-political candidate for the Presidency. 31% of the 65+ group stated that they would support a non-political candidate. In addition, the 18-24 age group says that they may support a non-political actor in the elections, depending on who the candidate is, with a significant rate of 45%.