YEREVAN. – The constitutional referendum in Turkey was one of the steps toward the country becoming more like Azerbaijan.

Armenia’s Caucasus Institute Director, political scientist Alexander Iskandaryan, noted the aforesaid at a press conference on Tuesday.

He added that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is claiming the “laurels” of his Azerbaijani counterpart, Ilham Aliyev.

“Turkey’s new constitution is similar to the Azerbaijani one,” noted Iskandaryan. “This process is very interesting, but, overall, Turkey is becoming ‘sultanized,’ and this is not something new.”

In the analyst’s words, Erdoğan organized this plebiscite to create a very strong internal tension in Turkey, and to come out as the winner. 

Also, he stressed that the referendum was conducted with gross violations.

“Everything was done so that people simply don’t come to the election districts,” added Iskandaryan. “There was a clear distribution of votes.”  

And with respect to the Turkish president’s reaction to the international assessments on this referendum, the political scientist noted that Erdoğan simply did not care about them.

“Also, Erdoğan stated that this was a victory against the bearers of Christianity,” added Alexander Iskandaryan. “He was referring to the educated urban people, considering that the educated masses of the big cities [of Turkey] voted against the new constitution.”

According to preliminary results, the Erdoğan-led “Yes” campaign has won the referendum in Turkey on April 16, by garnering 51.2 percent of the votes.

Eighteen constitutional amendments were put to the vote, and according to which Turkey is to transition from a parliamentary to a presidential system of government.

Turkish opposition and international analysts stress, however, that with these amendments, Erdoğan is gaining the sole right to govern the country, and that this is perilous for democracy and freedoms in the country.

He already has announced his plans for reinstating the death penalty in Turkey.