Turkish President Recept Tayyip Erdogan denied that he was trying to change the constitution so that he could stay when his term ends in three years.
Erdogan has led Turkey for 22 years, first serving as prime minister since 2003 and then as elected president since 2014.
“We want a new constitution for our nation, not for ourselves. I am not interested in being elected or appointed again,” he told reporters Thursday.
Still, Erdogan’s recent remarks and actions have heightened speculation that he wants to remain president after his term ended in 2028.
Last January, he was asked by the singer if he was up to run for another term, and he said, “I’m if you’re there.” The next day, his party spokesman confirmed that the issue lay on their agenda: “It’s important that our country wants it.”
Many Turks are hoping Erdogan will continue as president, but he has caught up in a poll behind Iklem Imamogul’s opposition mayor who was arrested in March and stays in prison.
Imamogul’s arrest on corruption charges he denied is widely seen as politically motivated by his supporters, sparking some of the biggest protests Turkey has seen in more than a decade.
Polls suggest that support for the mayor has risen since being detained in Silibri prisons in western Istanbul.
Authorities have managed to block social media feeds in X within Turkey, continuing to target the city’s government and detained at least 18 staff members on recent allegations of corruption, including municipality’s chief Tanner Setin.
Imamogul’s prison detention has been widely criticized internationally, but President Erdogan has largely escaped the blame, and Western allies see him as an important NATO alliance.
In a comment to a reporter on Wednesday, Erdogan said that the Turkish constitution, despite its amendment, was written primarily as a result of the 1980 military coup, and thus did not reflect the views of civilians.
“In such a rapidly changing world, can we go anywhere with a constitution written under the conditions of a coup?” he asked.
The current constitution only allows two five-year presidential terms. Erdogan is already in his third position, but he claimed that his first term took place before Turkey moved from parliamentary control to presidential control.
That change requires a constitutional referendum in 2017, and Erdogan gave cleaning power, but still only allows two presidential terms.
To get another referendum, it will require the support of 360 members in a 600-seat assembly, but can now rely on 321. You can quickly change the constitution with 400 votes.
His recent move to end a more than 40-year conflict with the Kurdish extremist PKK has been interpreted as a bid to attract Kurdish support for the new constitution.
Erdogan said on Wednesday that laying his arms would allow the PKK to continue politics by the Prokurd Dem party “in a much stronger way.”
The DEM Party has 56 lawmakers, and with their support, Erdogan will have a much greater chance of changing the constitution in Parliament.
Vice-chairman Ali Mahir Basarir, opposition CHP party of Ekrem Imamogul, said he had no chance to run again for the constitution that Erdogan had designed himself. Erdogan could have called early elections, but he didn’t allow them either, Bassarill said.
