CHP’s support quadruples in four Kurdish provinces since last election, shows survey

CHP Chair Kılıçdaroğlu visiitng Diyarbakır in March (Photo: CHP)

The popular support of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) in four Kurdish-majority provinces has quadrupled since the 2018 election, according to a new survey by the Rawest Research, a pollster exclusively focusing on the country’s Kurdish regions.

The survey was conducted in June in Diyarbakır, Urfa, Mardin and Van, where the CHP’s average voting rate was 2.7 percent in the last elections in 2018.

Among the 1,565 participants interviewed face-to-face, 9.8 percent said they would vote for the CHP if there were elections this Sunday. This voting rate is higher than the CHP was ever able to achieve in a region where its popular support has traditionally been very low.

The CHP’s support has increased at the expense of the support for the two leading parties in the region, the Kurdish-issue focused Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) and the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP).

The HDP’s voting rate dropped to 51.3 percent from 52.4 percent in the 2018 election and the AKP incurred a more significant loss from 34.7 percent to 23.8 percent.

The splinter movements from the AKP, the Democracy and Progress (DEVA) Party and the Future (Gelecek) Party get 4.7 percent and 2.7 percent of the votes, respectively, the survey showed.

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The AKP has been losing support in the country’s predominantly Kurdish-populated regions since the 2018 election, where it forged an alliance with the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), according to polls.

A poll Rawest conducted in March in a wider region also showed the same tendencies regarding all the three parties.

In 11 Kurdish-majority provinces, the AKP’s voting rate dropped from 36.4 percent in the 2018 election to 31.6 percent and the HDP’s voting rate dropped from 41.6 percent to 38.6 percent, according to that poll. The CHP’s support increased from 9.2 percent to 13.2 percent.

The next presidential and parliamentary elections are due to take place in June 2023.(VK)