The Justice and Development Party (AKP), which has been ruling Turkey as a single-party government since 2002, would have had a nationwide vote of around 28 percent if a general election were to have been held in October, according to a survey conducted by the Ankara-based MetroPoll.
The survey, titled “The Pulse of Turkey,” was conducted in October. Metropoll said support for the AKP has been falling since the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic in Turkey, where the first case was reported on March 11.
When asked which party they would vote for if a general election were held the following Sunday, 28.5 percent of respondents said they would vote for the AKP, while support for the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) stood at 17.2 percent. Support for the İYİ Party was 8.6 percent, 8.5 percent for the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) and 7.9 percent for the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP).
The survey showed support for the Deva Party and the Gelecek Party, which were established by former AKP heavyweights Ali Babacan and Ahmet Davutoğlu, respectively, at 1.5 percent and 0.9 percent, respectively.
The percentage of undecided voters was the highest figure in the MetroPoll survey, standing at 25.3 percent, meaning that one out of every four voters has not yet made up their minds about which party to vote for.
In the last general election held in June 2018, the AKP garnered a nationwide vote of 42.5 percent. However, public surveys have increasingly been showing the party’s public support to be slipping.