https://ahvalnews.com-Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s approval rating rose over two percentage points in March to 43.3 percent, according to the latest survey by leading Turkish pollster Metropoll.
Those who did not approve of how Erdoğan handles his job as president constituted 50.3 percent of the participants, while 6.5 percent did not provide an opinion, according to the survey announced on Tuesday, conducted with asked 1,535 people in 28 out of Turkey’s 81 provinces.
The Turkish president’s approval rating has seen a slow but steady rise in the Metropoll survey over the past few months after registering as low as 38.6 percent in December, when the currency tumbled past 14 to the dollar for the first time, triggering the central bank’s fourth intervention in currency markets that month.
The president’s approval rating measured the highest at 93.3 percent among Erdoğan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) voters, the study found.
Approval for the Turkish president registered the lowest among supports of the opposition centre-right main Good Party (İYİP), followed by the opposition secularist Republican People’s Party (CHP), with five and seven percent, respectively, the study found.
Supporters of the opposition AKP-breakaway Democracy and Progress Party (DEVA) registered a 75.9 percent disapproval of Erdoğan, according to the survey. Founded in 2020 by former deputy prime minister and Erdoğan ally Ali Babacan, DEVA is among Turkey’s newest parties.
A total of 78.9 percent of voters of the Islamist Felicity Party (SP), did not approve of Erdoğan, according to Metropoll.
Formed in 2001, the SP, like the AKP, traces its roots back to the Islamist Welfare Party, banned by the Constitutional Court in 1998, from which many of the founders of the AKP originate.
Supporters of the pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) registered a 12.4 percent approval rating for Erdoğan, according to Metrpoll’s March survey, while 81.9 percent said they did not approve of the way the Turkish leader is handling his job.
The survey arrives as Turkey grapples with soaring inflation that measured at 54 percent in February, amid a countdown to the next elections general elections scheduled for 2023, the centenary of the Turkish Republic.