Turkey’s main opposition party officially splits as Özel declares New Party
- Most CHP deputies have backed ousted leader Özgür Özel’s plan to establish a new party.
- The split follows months of leadership crisis and corruption investigations targeting the municipalities controlled by CHP.
- The CHP has now officially lost its main opposition status.
Özgür Özel, the former leader of the Republican People’s Party (CHP), has officially declared the founding of the New (Yeni) Party, along with 90 deputies who resigned today from the CHP.
The departure of the MPs reduced the CHP’s parliamentary group to 44 seats, which means it has lost the main opposition status, which the party has held since 2002.
Özel's planned new party gets support from overwhelming majority of CHP deputies
Özel signed the new party’s founding documents and announced his resignation from the CHP in a video.
“May it be for the good of our homeland, our nation, our party and all of us,” he said at the end of the recording.
Özel also changed the photograph on his official X account and removed the description identifying him as CHP chair.
The party’s founding team submitted a petition to the Interior Ministry, beginning the formal registration process. Media reports said the date was chosen because it marked the anniversary of the Lausanne Treaty, which established the borders of modern Turkey.
Subsequently, Özel was elected the party leader.
After the formalities, Özel walked with his team to the First Parliament building, where the Republic's foundation was declared in 1923, where he met with the public.
Özel had announced plans to establish the party during a CHP parliamentary group meeting earlier this week.
Leadership crisis at CHP
The split of the republic's founding party followed a leadership crisis triggered by a court ruling in May that annulled the CHP’s Nov 2023 congress over alleged irregularities. Özel defeated Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu at that congress, ending Kılıçdaroğlu’s 14-year tenure as party leader.
However, the court declared the congress "absolutely null," concluding that delegates had been compromised with money and promises of party positions. It removed Özel from office and reinstated Kılıçdaroğlu as CHP leader.
Özel’s faction appealed to the Court of Cassation, the highest appeals court, but the case was not heard before the judicial recess that began on Jul 20.
The group also sought an extraordinary congress, saying it had collected the required number of delegate signatures, but the Kılıçdaroğlu administration did not initiate a new congress.
With legal proceedings to regain the party leadership remained unresolved, Özel moved to establish a new party.
Kılıçdaroğlu-Özel rivalry
The divisions emerged after Kılıçdaroğlu lost the May 2023 presidential election to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. İstanbul’s suspended mayor, Ekrem İmamoğlu, later led calls for change within the CHP and supported Özel’s successful leadership bid.
Members of the defeated faction subsequently filed lawsuits alleging that supporters of Özel and İmamoğlu had secured delegate votes through financial incentives and promises of party appointments.
İmamoğlu was detained in March last year as part of a corruption investigation and has remained in prison while facing several trials. Days after his detention, Özel named İmamoğlu as the CHP’s presidential candidate.
Authorities have since expanded investigations into CHP-run municipalities and suspended dozens of mayors, including those of Antalya, Adana and Bursa.
The Özel-İmamoğlu bloc claims the investigations are politically motivated and intended to weaken the opposition after the CHP handed the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) its worst local election defeat in 2024.
The government denies the allegation, pointing out that some witnesses and complainants in the investigations are also CHP members.
(VK)
