AKP loses out in Bosphorus area

The casual polling undertaken by the Hürriyet Daily News & Economic Review in Sarıyer, seen as an akp stronghold, revealed a major shift from the akp to the Saadet (Felicity) Party, the far-right Nationalist Movement Party, or mhp and the Republican People’s Party, or chp.In the poor neighborhood of Küçük Armutlu, the fact that most houses are illegal played an important part in the way the people voted. Most said they voted for the akp in the 2004 local elections because it had promised to give them deeds but this time around they switched their allegiance because the akp failed to keep its promise.A woman wearing a chador who declined to give her name said she first prayed and then voted. She said she would be reading the Koran in the evening for everyone’s goodness while waiting at Dumlupınar Elementary School in Küçük Armutlu where she cast her ballot.’Responsible voting’"Everyone is responsible for their votes in the afterlife so they should think twice before voting," said A.K., a women with a headscarf who also declined to give her name. She said she voted for the Saadet Party because the akp did not care for Islam and had also sold out the motherland to foreigners.Kiraz Ekici, also wearing a headscarf, said she voted for the mhp and visited people one by one to call on them to vote the same way. In Küçük Armutlu people are tired of unfulfilled promises, especially in the case of unregistered homes. Gamze Gülnur Say said she wanted the mhp or dsp to win in Sarıyer because the akp had not kept any of its promises. "They sent Nimet Çubukçu to our neighborhood but nobody believes in their promises anymore," she said.In the affluent neighborhood of Etiler, a majority of voters said they cared about voting especially because they were unhappy with the present government in the municipality.The elderly voters supporting the main opposition, chp, were not so hopeful, but they were more interested than young people. Güven Kipmen, a retiree sitting out front of the school where he voted, said he voted for the chp but was not too optimistic they would win. He complained that people did not care about ideologies or honesty, but voted in line with their incomes. Kıymet Saygılı, another elderly supporter of the chp, blamed the younger generation for the all the ills that have beset the country. "They are not interested in politics at all," he said. Erman Soydan, a student sitting close to Saygılı, however, said he did not vote because he had exams Monday and did not have time to go to his hometown in the east of the country. As older chp voters complained about disinterest, others were worried about cheating during and after the elections.Some chp voters waited outside the voting stations for the security of the ballot boxes because they did not trust the normal procedures. Sercan Çelbiş, 32, said she feared the ballot boxes would be stolen. "We will wait until the voting ends. Some votes were thrown into the rubbish in some previous elections," said Celbiş, a chp supporter and election volunteer.Although there were people waiting to vote or for their relatives to vote in front of Türkan Şoray Elementary School, none complained about crowds because the queues were proceeding rapidly. One of the common problems involved voters who did not have ID cards with an identity number on them. A polling clerk, who declined to give her name, said they had to refuse people who did not have the correct ID. Another problem was the confusion in the voting sequence, as electorates living in ıstanbul cast a ballot for five candidates at a time. Serkan Genç said he voted to change the current government but he is not sure whether the newcomers will be any better.