Is the AKP finally losing?

Will the June 7 elections be the first electoral defeat of the tall, bald and bold man yelling at everyone? Many political strategists and pollsters agree that even if the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) might still get over 40 percent of the vote, there will be a considerable decline in support for it compared to the over 50 percent that President Recep Tayyip Erdo?an received in the presidential election last year, or the almost 50 percent that the AKP won in the last parliamentary elections.

But will an eight or nine-point decline in the AKP vote be enough to cause a change of government? Did not the AKP come to power with a "landslide" 34 percent of the vote in 2002? Was not 34 percent enough for it to rule alone in its first term? The distribution of the votes, the performance of other parties, and the number of parties successfully overcoming the anti-democratic 10 percent electoral threshold, are all factors that determine the outcome of the elections. Of course, equally important will be the level of participation.

In 2002, key parties remained below the 10 percent threshold and only 53 percent of the votes cast in the election were reflected in parliament. The AKP therefore won 365 seats with only 34.3 percent of the vote, while the Republican People's Party (CHP) won 178 seats with only 19.4 percent of the vote.

In the 2007 elections, the AKP increased its electoral support to 46.6 percent, but its parliamentary strength decreased to 341 seats, because this time three parties and a group of independents (mostly Kurds) made it into parliament, overcoming the national or local thresholds. In 2007, the CHP won a lower (112 seat) parliamentary presence with a higher 20.9 percent of the vote. The third party to enter...