Trends and prospects for the election of the Turkish Cypriot leader
We proceeded with a grouping of communities and Nicosia /Famagusta town-quarters according to the number of registered voters. We have four groups (arbitrary defined):
- Size over 2000 registered voters. This is 27 communities /quarters totalling 96195 voters or 48.35% of the electoral body.
- From 1000 to 2000, 30 communities, with 44100 voters – 22.17 of the total
- From 600 to 1000, 33 communities with 25318 voters – 12.73% of the total
- Less than 600 registered, 124 communities, 33344 voters – 16.76% of the total
The share of the main candidates in the first round is as follows:
|
Registered |
VOTED |
ABSTENTION |
VALID |
INVALID |
TATAR |
ERHURMAN |
OZERSAY |
AKINCI |
DENKTAS |
ARIKLI |
||
| Total |
198957 |
115968 |
83036 |
110915 |
5051 |
35872 |
24075 |
6365 |
33058 |
4627 |
5999 |
|
| 2000+ |
96195 |
54276 |
41934 |
52125 |
2150 |
14029 |
11339 |
3019 |
19472 |
1968 |
1909 |
|
| 1000-2000 |
44100 |
25567 |
18547 |
24432 |
1135 |
8883 |
5328 |
1400 |
5858 |
1103 |
1657 |
|
| 600-1000 |
25318 |
15512 |
9806 |
14682 |
830 |
5367 |
3160 |
845 |
3528 |
669 |
983 |
|
| 600- |
33344 |
20613 |
12749 |
19676 |
936 |
7593 |
4248 |
1101 |
4200 |
887 |
1450 |
|
| VOTERS |
Registered |
VOTED |
ABSTENTION |
VALID |
INVALID |
TATAR |
ERHURMAN |
OZERSAY |
AKINCI |
DENKTASH |
ARIKLI |
AKI+ERH |
| Total |
198957 |
115968 |
41.7 |
110915 |
6.1 |
32.3 |
21.7 |
5.7 |
29.8 |
4.2 |
5.4 |
51.5 |
| 2000+ |
96195 |
54276 |
43.6 |
52125 |
5.1 |
26.9 |
21.8 |
5.8 |
37.4 |
3.8 |
3.7 |
59.1 |
| 1000-2000 |
44100 |
25567 |
42.1 |
24432 |
6.1 |
36.4 |
21.8 |
5.7 |
24.0 |
4.5 |
6.8 |
45.8 |
| 600-1000 |
25318 |
15512 |
38.7 |
14682 |
8.5 |
36.6 |
21.5 |
5.8 |
24.0 |
4.6 |
6.7 |
45.6 |
| 600- |
33344 |
20613 |
38.2 |
19676 |
7.3 |
38.6 |
21.6 |
5.6 |
21.3 |
4.5 |
7.4 |
42.9 |
In the big communities /quarters, Mustafa Akıncı has a clear advantage over Tatar, with 37.4% against 26.9%. When taking the sum of Akıncı and Tufan Erhürman, the sum is a crushing 59.1%. From the 27 communities /quarters, they total more than 50%. The exception are Yerolakkos (41.6%) and Canakkale (48.8%) quarter in Famagusta. They are both inhabited by settlers. The remainder of votes from Denktaş, Özersay and Arıklı is 13.3% or 6900 votes.
The second group of communities /quarters includes many non-mixed settlers – inhabited communities, and quarters in Famagusta town. In this group Arıklı secured from 10% to 20.2% in 10 communities and on average 6.%. The trends are in opposite direction. In 12 out of these 30 communities the sum of Akıncı and Erhürman vote is more than 50%, while their average for the group is 45.8%. Tatar’s share is 10 percentage units more than in the big communities (36.4%. The vote of the other three totals 17% or 4160 votes.
Communities from 600 to 1000 voters have similar features as those up to 2000 voters, i.e. they include several settlers inhabited villages, and the trends are opposing. In 15 of the 33 communities the sum of Akıncı and Erhürman is over 50%, while their average is exactly the same with the previous group, at 45.6%. The average share of each of the three main candidates is exactly the same with the previous group with Tatar at 36.4%, Akıncı and Erhürman at 24% and 21.5% respectively. The vote of the other three was 17% or 2797 votes.
The remainder of communities include most of the non-mixed settlers inhabited ones. In 30 out of these 128 villages, Arıklı got from 10 up to 43% of the vote. The opposing trends show the sum of Akıncı and Erhürman at over 50% in 44 villages. However, in many cases, their vote is very low, as law as 3% only. Overall this sum is only 2.5% lower than in the previous groups of communities. Tatar’s average is two points higher, at 38.6%, while Akıncı and Erhürman are over 21%. Remainder vote of the three other is 17.5%.
Scenarios of work
The first working hypothesis would be, what if turnout remains the same as in first round and Akinci secures all the votes of Erhürman from the first round? Simply, game over! Akinci would not need any of the remained votes, which amount to around 17000.
Second scenario: Akinci wins 80% of Erhürman’s vote, which is 19260 votes. In that case, in order to win he would need to capture around 4750 votes or 28% (less than in in three) from the remainder 17000. Is that possible? This might put the contest on balance. It is expected that he might get a small part of settler vote that was given to Arıklı, which means that he would need about 4000 votes from Denktaş and Özersay. My view is that he can get up to 40% of the 11000 of that vote, which would secure him the win.
Turning to Tatar, he needs not only to secure all the votes from the other three, he would also need more than 3000 votes from Erhürman’s share. Is it possible?
- There are good reasons to assume that at least 30% of the 11000 who voted the candidates of the Democratic Party – DP and the People’s Party – HP would not cast a vote for Tatar. There are ideological reasons, there are reasons linked to his policies and his government, including the way they handed the coronavirus problems and the economy. I dare say that this might also be the case for a part of the settlers that are more disadvantaged that the rest of the population. However, such an assumption should be cautiously advanced, since we know little about how this community functions.
- The last scenario is that we forget the initial hypothesis of minimal change in turnout and assume that massive turnout favours Tatar. Is such a scenario possible?
The higher abstention rates in bigger communities may leave room for a higher turnout. If so, can more votes be cast for Tatar in such numbers as to overturn the clear advantage for Akıncı, who totals with Erhürman 59% there? Doesn’t this latter point indicate that the Republican Turkish Party’s – CTP machine can work with their supported candidate more efficiently to gain and not to lose any votes? On the other hand, the trends developed in this group of communities in the past, since at least the referendum of 2004, are against the line and policies followed by Tatar. In areas around Nicosia, with Gyoneli, Mintzeli, Neapolis, Omorphita, the vote for Akıncı in 2015 was higher than his 60% average.
Last but equally important, mobilisation in big townships or towns is much harder to achieve as it requires more people, more effort and a certain favourable momentum. We have not seen this in the case of Tatar.
With regard to turnout, I did not expect to write this piece the day of the vote after such figures are published. I have already written that I did not expect a turnout significally higher than last Sunday.
Conclusions
Quite often, or rather after each election, I use to say “with each election we learn new things, we see phenomena that we did not expect”. However, even being cautious when making predictions, I would be extremely surprised if the new lesson would be a reversal of the above explained scenario showing that the winner would be Mustafa Akıncı. Without interference to the free expression of the people’s will, a re-election appears secured.