Berat Albayrak, Turkey’s treasury and finance minister and son-in-law of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, on Wednesday said the country has left the worst behind as consumer inflation climbed to one of the highest levels since Erdoğan came to power 15 years ago.
The Turkish Statistics Institute (TurkStat) announced early Wednesday that annual inflation had reached 24.52 percent in September, up from 17.90 in August. The monthly rate was 6.3 percent, driven by an across-the-board spike provoked by the lira’s meltdown.
“We have left the worst behind. September was the worst month for inflation expectations,” Albayrak told news channel NTV, the state-run Anadolu news agency reported.
Albayrak also blamed hoarders and speculators and predicted inflation would stop rising in October.
“As we mentioned in our new economic program, we will set a specific program for a total fight against inflation,” added Albayrak.
The new economic program, which was announced on Sept. 20, sets the inflation target for 2018 at 20.8 percent, 15.9 percent for the next year, 9.8 percent for 2020 and 6 percent for 2021.