All eyes are on razor-tight UK race

Politicians in the UK made their final pitch for votes on the last day of campaigning before the EU referendum that will shape the future course of Europe. In both ways, the results will be followed by marathon talks on disengagement with the UK in case of Brexit or to implement concessions made by Brussels to keep London in the bloc.
Prospect of Britain becoming the first state to defect from the EU has raised fears of a domino-effect. The erosion of national state in favour of Brussels is already sending shock waves across Europe.
Yet, those in favour of the EU stress that Brussels is open for more ideas, citing the recent concessions the bloc has given to the UK to stay in the EU.
The race is so tight. The outcome looks deeply uncertain, as a poll by Survation gave ‘Remain’ 45 percent and ‘Leave’ 44 percent, with 11 percent undecided. There is a consensus that the undecided will determine the results should they decide to vote at eleventh hour.
But six major bookmakers showed the odds heavily pointing to a ‘Remain’ vote, with the likelihood of Britain staying ‘in’ put at around 80 percent. The latest surveys were mostly conducted after the brutal murder of Jo Cox, a 41-year-old Labour politician who campaigned to remain in the EU, and was murdered in her northern English constituency last Thursday. Perhaps sympathy with the slain MP might change the polls towards the ‘Remain’ camp.
Though the ‘Remain’ and ‘Leave’ camps made their cases with economy and immigration respectively high on the agenda, the general campaign has been characterized with the scaremongering blended with facts.
Each side sugarcoated its campaign to canvass votes. The pro-EU London Mayor Sadiq Khan tore into his predecessor Boris Johnson, a key campaigner on the ‘Leave’ side. “You’re telling lies and you’re scaring people,” Khan had declared as he brandished a ‘Leave’ leaflet.
The ‘Leave’ campaign cleverly used the immigration card to address the worst fears of Britons when it insinuated that Turkey with a population of 78.7 million would soon join the EU. This suggested, to the chagrin of Britons, the Turks would immediately head to the UK. So the ‘Leave’ campaign suggested it was better to exit before the Turks arrive.
This intimation angered the ‘Remain’ campaign. “That’s scaremongering, Boris, and you should be ashamed … you are using the ruse of Turkey to scare people to vote Leave,” Khan said to cheers from the audience.
But Boris Johnson threw the criticism back at Khan, saying the pro-EU side had run a ‘Project Fear’ by warning that leaving the 28-member bloc would damage Britain’s economy. “They say we have no choice but to bow down to Brussels,” he said. To him, Thursday will be Britain’s “independence day” if it votes to leave.
For the first time, the larger European project is in danger given repercussions of Brexit that could stall the ambitious EU project, which secured peace on the continent after World War II, moved hundreds of millions of people towards greater prosperity, and helped entrench liberal democracy in Eastern Europe after the Soviet collapsed.
It has to be seen whether the Brexit would undo everything Europeans had worked together to achieve. All eyes are on the photo-finish British vote now. Will it be a ‘Black Friday’ or a ‘Fresh Friday’ for Europe?