Noticias

More than 50 million Turkish people go to the polls to vote in the local elections on March 30, amid security concerns raised from both the government and the opposition. 

The Higher Election Board (YSK) has announced that a total of 52,695,831 people are eligible for voting, at a total of 177,044 polling stations. 

Voting will start at 7 a.m. in the eastern provinces of Turkey and will end at 4 p.m. In western Turkey, voting will be between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m.

More than 52 million Turks are expected to go to the ballot box on March 30. They will elect mayors and other local administrators, who will be in office for the next five years. In other words, this is not a general election that will change the structure of parliament and the government. That election is scheduled for July 2015. Yet, many see these local elections as extremely significant, because it has taken the form of an implicit referendum on the popularity of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Four important political forces will compete with each other from the outset:

Despite the buzz created by his high-pitched voice, Prime MinisterRecep Tayyip Erdoğan took the stage again during a rally in the southeastern province of Diyarbakırfor another electoral address March 27.

The Peoples’ Democracy Party (HDP), sister party of the Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) which is focused on the Kurdish issue, has denied allegations that they are in a bargain with the ruling Justice and Democracy Party (AKP) over voter support for some 10,000 job positions in the Istanbul municipality.

Sırrı Süreyya Önder, a member of Parliament and HDP mayoral candidate for the Istanbul municipality told Hürriyet Daily News there was no bargaining over anything with the AKP in Istanbul.

With just days to go before crucial local elections in Turkey, concerns about the credibility of ballots are being raised from varying parts of the political spectrum. 

The ruling Justice and Development Party’s (AKP) Ayşenur İslam and opposition Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahçeli have been the latest figures to raise questions on the issue. 
İslam, Turkey’s Family and Social Policy Minister, claimed that the way her party could be beaten on March 30 was “through cheating.” 

The United Nations on March 25 called on Turkey to stop blocking Twitter, saying Ankara could be breaching its international rights obligations by banning the social networking site.

"We are concerned that the blocking of access to Twitter on the 20th of March by the telecommunications agency may be incompatible with Turkey's international human rights obligations," said Rupert Colville, spokesman for the U.N. high commissioner for human rights.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has escalated his salvo against the “double standards” of Twitter, while also defiantly warning Facebook and YouTube to “obey Turkish laws.”

Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen has criticized the Turkish government for a police crackdown on protesters during last year’s Gezi Park demonstrations in which a number of people were killed.