By Kamran Gasanov
Ever since the Republican People’s Party lost the parliamentary elections and failed to get its president in May 2023, it has been struggling internally. One-party members started accusing then leader and presidential candidate Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu of preventing other more popular candidates from being the CHP’s representative, which caused them to fail. Therefore, as early as November 2023, the CHP changed its leader to Özgür Özel.
In March 2024, the party was able to regain faith in its strength by winning a landslide victory in the municipal elections. However, the conflict within the party is not over, and consolidation is essential in future presidential and parliamentary elections. Although they will not officially take place until three years from now, given the demands for early elections, the CHP should be concerned with the issue of a main candidate now.
The issue of party unity is further fuelled by opinion polls. To the surprise of Özel’s fellow party members, Erdoğan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) is no longer behind the CHP and is in first place.
Imamoğlu or Yavaş?
The main reason for the dispute between CHP representatives remains internal disagreements over the choice of the most favourable candidate for the presidential election. At the centre of the conflict are three key figures: party chairman Özgür Özel, Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoğlu and Ankara Mayor Mansur Yavaş. Özel, in an effort to strengthen his position, has proposed an intra-party ‘primary’ to determine the candidate. His initiative is very much disliked by Yavaş, who is considered the most popular Republican candidate according to opinion polls. The criteria for selecting a candidate in the party may not coincide with the sympathies of the ordinary population, and Yavaş risks losing. Therefore, he refused to participate in the ‘primaries’, saying that he considers it more important to focus on solving the country’s economic problems, which further complicates the internal situation in the CHP.
Yavaş’s main opponent is Imamoğlu. The Istanbul mayor has great influence in the CHP structure. A clear proof of this is the controversy in 2023 over the choice of a candidate for the presidential election. Meral Akşener, one of the leaders of the six-party opposition bloc and head of the Good Party (IYI), refused to run in the presidential election in favour of Imamoğlu and later threatened to leave the alliance if Kılıçdaroğlu did not support Imamoğlu. Imamoğlu was not nominated then, partly because of Kılıçdaroğlu’s personal ambitions and partly because of pending lawsuits against Imamoğlu. The trial has been ongoing since late 2022, when the Istanbul mayor received two years and 7 months in prison for insulting members of Türkiye’s Supreme Election Board. The sentence was appealed and referred to an appeals court.
Although Yavaş has higher support among the public, Imamoğlu is still a powerful figure at the centre of the party structure. The debate over who will represent the party in the elections is exacerbated by personal ambitions and discontent among MPs and local party organisations. The CHP still has plenty of time before the next election, but if they are betting on an early election, the ranks in the party will have to close. Otherwise, the failure of 2023 could happen again.
The CHP’s internal friction is also exacerbated by the influence of former party leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, who has accused current leaders of ‘betrayal’ and ‘falsification’ because they chose Özel, not him, as chairman at past party congresses. Kılıçdaroğlu, with his great experience and still supported by a certain part of the CHP members, continues to exert his influence on the political processes within the party, which also negatively affects its cohesion and ability to fight the AKP and Erdoğan. So not only Yavaş’s popularity, but also the ‘shadow of Kılıçdaroğlu’ will put sticks in the wheels of Özel and Imamoğlu’s alliance.
Who will the West support?
Commenting on the internal political struggle in the main opposition party, Mehmet Perinçek, a historian and representative of the Turkish ‘Motherland Party’ in Russia, said that the West will bet on the mayor of Istanbul.
‘The main project of the Atlanticists in Türkiye is Ekrem Imamoğlu. The Atlanticist forces have been working for a long time to make Ekrem Imamoğlu the opposition’s candidate to be elected president of Türkiye. You can think of him as a Turkish Saakashvili, a Turkish Zelensky or a Turkish Pashinyan. Erdoğan, of course, has also recently started to pursue a pro-Western, pro-Atlantic policy, for example on the Syrian issue and the Ukrainian issue, but he and his party are certainly not under the full control of the Atlantists. The Atlantists need a puppet president. It is Imamoğlu who fits this role. That is why the Atlanticist forces support his candidacy, nominated him in the Republican People’s Party,’ he told Vestnik Kavkaza.
The historian noted that the CHP has lost its main mission: ‘They have completely forgotten about it. CHP is no longer Ataturk’s party.’ Other leaders of the party are also heavily influenced by the West, but ‘Imamoğlu is a direct project of the Atlanticists’.
Perinçek believes that Türkiye’s incumbent president, who is trying to remedy the country’s economic situation at the expense of good ties, should be on his guard.
‘Erdoğan needs to realise that he will never be the main man of the Atlanticists in Türkiye. They have long ago decided to get rid of Erdoğan, even tried to overthrow him through a military coup. Erdoğan is still looking for compromises and strategic relations at the door of the Atlanticists, but he won’t succeed. After the presidential election in 2023, he embarked on a completely pro-Western economic policy, seeking to overcome the economic crisis with the help of Western banks and funds, British and American. But in reality, the Atlanticists do not support him. Erdoğan should learn lessons from this: He has no future in the Atlanticist world,’ says Perinçek.
The expert believes that the most correct choice for Türkiye is to turn towards Eurasia and get closer to Russia, Iran, China and the Turkic world. ‘If Erdoğan looks for compromises or common interests with the West, it will not help him, and Imamoğlu will eventually become the main man of the Atlantists in power. Erdoğan needs to find and create strategic co-operation that can balance this threat from the Atlanticists, rather than seeking compromises with the latter,’ Perinçek concluded.