Babacan addresses AKP voter base, asks them to choose between ‘peace’ and ‘crisis’

Duvar English

Democracy and Progress Party (DEVA) leader and former deputy prime minister Ali Babacan has addressed the voter base of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), saying the upcoming election is very crucial and it will decide whether Turkey will plunge into further authoritanism or choose democracy.

“Joint wisdom or one wisdom? Peace or crisis? Richness or poverty? Freedom of oppression? Law or arbitrariness? Hope or fear? Love or anger?” Babacan said, asking AKP voters to choose between the two.

Babacan made the comments during a meeting of his party’s provincial heads in the capital Ankara on April 18.

He said that citizens who previously voted for the AKP are now saying “I am no more inclined to vote for this poverty, this oppression.” “Yes, you are not inclined to vote for the AKP as you don’t want to choose poverty, corruption, inflation exceeding 100 percent…You are not inclined to vote for injustice, unlawfulness, oppression, I know.”

He said that President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan whom they had previously voted for is no longer the same and “has changed.” “Let’s see this all together. He turned his back on justice, common wisdom, and consultation that he had initially vowed. You are not inclined to vote for a mentality who moved out from his humble apartment flat in (Ankara's) Keçiören and constructed a massive palace.”

Babacan said that Turkey currently faces two scenarios. In the first scenario, the country will deteriorate further and in the second scenario, “there is a new breath, new home, freedom, richness and justice.”

He said that the AKP government is listing what the country’s problems are and promising to fix them, as if they are not the ones who have been ruling the country for the last 21 years. “The reason of a crisis can’t solve that crisis,” Babacan said.