Looking In: Majority in dispute

Turkey held a referendum on a package of 18 proposed changes to its constitution on Sunday.These changes, taken together, will transform Turkey’s parliamentary system from one with the prime minister as the premier and a ceremonial presidency to a system with an executive presidency, empowered to dismiss parliament, pack courts and make other decisions detrimental to Turkey’s democracy.

The result was 51.4 percent Yes, 48.6 percent No. The Yes campaign -- led by President Tayyip Erdogan, the main beneficiary of the power grab, the Justice and Development Party (AKP) leader Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım and the National Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahceli -- was quick to declare victory.The combined vote share of AKP and MHP was over 60 percent in the last elections, but now they barely squeaked a majority. No win in major metropoles: Istanbul, Ankara, Izmir.

However, this is not Turkey’s Brexit. The result of this vote is not a simple one and one not beyond legal reproach. Since the coup attempt last July, Turkey has been under a state of emergency, leading to purges and an atmosphere of fear. This vote does not qualify as free and fair, not with the despotism throughout the campaigns and reported fraud on Sunday.

Additionally, many opposition media organs have been shut down, their owners and journalists jailed or in exile. State television gave disproportionate airtime to the Yes campaign, and the AKP used state institutions to bolster the Yes campaign and crack down on opposition. Only the state-owned Anadolu Agency reported the results on Sunday.

The crackdown went further with the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP). Its leaders, many ministers of parliament and mayors from this party have been jailed, leaving the No campaign without the means to run an effective campaign, while the Yes campaign, led by the autocrat Erdogan, had the entire state apparatus behind it.

HDP’s sidelining and criminalization served to marginalize and silence Turkey’s Kurdish minority, concentrated in the southeast. However, the major blow against this already repressed population came from the year-long campaign of violent attacks, house arrests, politically motived curfews and other means of crackdown perpetrated by the government. There are 500,000 persons displaced due to fighting, according to an estimate by The New York Times, and they could not vote. This is a reason why turnout and the No vote in Kurdish provinces was underwhelming. That number is significant.

Most importantly, this referendum is fraught with historic fraud. The election commission made a rule change after voting was closed, allowing for fraudulent votes to go on as counted. Two main opposition parties will be contesting two-thirds of all ballot boxes for this. With such widespread fraud and a close result despite that, this is far from over. Protests on either side are still ongoing. The will of the majority is not apparent. Brexit, though disappointing to many, presented an undisputable majority. This referendum, facilitated under unfair means, does not show the clear will of the people. It will take days to cut through the fraud and declare official results. This was not a clean fight. And it is not over.