Continuing our series on Turkish candidates standing at this General Election, we turn the spotlight on Naz Osmanoglu who has been capturing national media attention with his appearance in a party election broadcast for the CBA.
CBA stands for ‘Can’t Be Arsed’ and, according to Osmanoglu’s clip, they represent the “silent majority, the unheard third”. His appeal is to 35% of the electorate – a whopping 15.8 million Britons – who chose not to vote in the last General Election. In 2015, CBA received a staggering 6.5 mn more support than voters gave to Labour (9.3 mn), and 4.5 more than to the Tories (11.3 mn), making them the largest political block in Britain by a long shot.
The 3-minute clip states the CBA continues to grow, highlighting that in Manchester alone 56% of registered voters didn’t vote in 2015. “Most of these were young people”, says Osmanoglu.
The suited and well-spoken Osmanoglu is then shown stepping out into central London to meet his party supporters – those members of the public who have unwittingly joined the CBA due to their preference not to exercise their democratic rights. He cheers each one on as they tell him why they won’t be voting and aren’t interested in politics.
A stand-up comic by profession and 16th in line to the (now defunct) Ottoman throne, Osmanoglu’s tongue-in-cheek clip highlights the ridiculousness of not voting. It’s sponsored by Forever Beta – a creative agency in Britain. The company hopes its comedic style will make young people think about why they should be engaged in politics: their short CBA clip closes with a call to action asking people to “be arsed, vote on the 8th of June”.
See the clip below and here’s a link to the CBA website. You can follow Naz on Twitter.
