The mayor of Istanbul and the Turkish president Erdogan, two rivals who look alike

On Wednesday, a court of first instance sentenced the mayor of Istanbul, Ekrem Imamoglu, to 2 years, 7 months and 15 days in prison, a sentence accompanied by a suspension of the same duration from his political activities. He was accused of having “insulted” the members of the High Electoral Council, treated as “idiots” for having invalidated his narrow victory in March 2019. A new ballot, demanded by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, had confirmed the election of the opponent Imamoglu by a very large majority in June 2019. The Turkish head of state had experienced this episode as a humiliation. Hadn’t he prophesied, a few years earlier, that “whoever wins Istanbul, wins Turkey”?