Despite the corruption allegations, Twitter ban and seemingly incriminating leaked tapes, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) won approximately 44% of the popular vote in municipal elections on March 30, according to the official tally.

Erdogan’s victory speech offered no olive branches or open hands. It was instead a clenched fist. The prime minister’s remarks conveyed his sense of righteous vindication and included a warning to his political opponents that “we will enter their lair. … They are going to pay the price.”

As Cengiz Candar writes: “Among the difficult-to-forget moments of election night were Erdogan’s emergence onto the balcony, waving his hands and raising the four-finger salute of support for the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood and his declaring the situation between Turkey and Syria a “state of war” (which, of course, had nothing to do with international law).”

Candar and most analysts expect Erdogan to be even more emboldened to make a presidential run in elections scheduled for August 2014, while launching a public vendetta against the Gulen movement, which Erdogan blames for the corruption allegations and leaks.