SerpApi.Org
Turkish opposition leader Ozgur Ozel confirmed on July 22 that in the face of the Erdogan administration “political coup” that has thrown the 103-year-old Republican People’s Party (CHP) into crisis, he will resign his post and create a new party.
In parliament, speaking to 80 CHP lawmakers, Ozel said it was time to embark on a new kind of opposition to Turkey’s leader of 23 years Erdogan.
He did not name the new party that will replace the CHP, created by founder of the Turkish Republic Mustafa Kemal Ataturk in 1923, but, as reported by Reuters, declared: 'Today, we are on the brink of a sad farewell that has become inevitable and whose time has come. However, we would like to share with the people that we carry the hope of a new beginning.'
The news service said that the lawmakers and other supporters cheered and chanted 'Free Turkey, free future', referring to Ozel's name, which means 'free' in Turkish. It quoted one supporter as saying: 'Finally. We don't have time to lose with pointless fights within the party.'
In announcing the decision to form a new party, Ozel said he would not 'leave behind' the CHP’s jailed candidate for the next presidential election, Istanbul mayor Ekrem Imamoglu, or Ankara Mayor Mansur Yavas, seen as another potential challenger to Erdogan.
Ozel was quoted by bianet as saying that 'our party [CHP] is now under the captivity and occupation of a system confined by annulment rulings.' That was a reference to a court ruling in May that officially removed him from office due to alleged irregularities in the 2023 leadership congress in which he was elected and reinstated his predecessor Kemal Kilicdaroglu.
The CHP contends that the case was cooked up by regime officials and that Kilicdaroglu, in accepting the court-ordered return to the helm of the CHP, has become a puppet of the palace.
The decision to establish a new party appears to have been taken after the CHP made little to no progress in challenging the annulment rulings through the court.
In mid-June, IntelliNews reported how analysts were declaring the death of the CHP in the face of prosecutions and other disruptions mounted as part of an attack by the ruling Erdogan administration (see Death of Turkey’s opposition declared by analysts). Ozel, meanwhile, has been under fire for becoming the “master of the loud-but-useless protest” (see article here).
The CHP has 135 lawmakers among parliament’s 600 MPs, while Erdogan’s ruling AKP and its allies have 328. Most of the CHP MPs are likely to shift to Ozel's new party.
Of the other lawmakers, the leftist pro-Kurdish DEM Party and its allies have 63 MPs, the Turkish nationalist IYI Party has 29, smaller opposition parties have 26 and there are 11 independents.
Depending on how negotiations proceed over the “Kurdish peace” question, DEM and allied lawmakers could lend their votes to Erdogan on vital matters.
Reuters said analysts saw the new party as possibly benefitting Erdogan and the AKP by splitting the opposition camp and undermining its solidarity.
'This picture can only change if the new party can create a very strong societal response and transform into the main hub of the opposition,' Murat Gezici, chairman of pollster Gezici, was quoted as saying, adding: 'However, in the short and medium-term, the political arithmetic works in favour of Erdogan and the AKP.'
On July 15, IntelliNews reported on imprisoned mayor Imamoglu’s protests that in the face of a mountain of allegations, he has been given barely three minutes per charge to defend himself in court.
Turkish prosecutors, meanwhile, continue to go after critics of Erdogan that they claim have crossed the line. At the start of this month, stand-up comedian Deniz Goktas, whose show depicting Erdogan as a “shy dictator” who has transformed into a dictator “at peace with his own identity” went viral, was detained as he returned from a trip abroad.
