‘CHANGE’ IN CHP

"Change" in CHP

27.04.2025

After Mr. Özgür Özel was elected as the chairman, the process that was initiated under the name of normalization and the increase in bilateral contacts with the AK Party and our President increased our hope for the future as a people after a long time.

Following these steps, as a result of both certain statements made by the party staff and the emergence of new trump cards within the party, it began to be generally accepted that the change in the CHP was aimed at gaining time against its own voters.

It would not be wrong to say that the struggle for seats within the party, which broke out at the statute convention right after the local elections, created the belief within the CHP that Özgür Özel was not a leader but a mediator. Despite a long preparation for a speech by the Ekrem İmamoğlu team, the speech crisis that was reported to Mansur Yavaş one hour before the end, which was also reported by Özgür Özel, ended with a complaint from Mr. Yavaş. Although Özgür Özel tried to bring the two together and give a pose of unity, Mansur Yavaş does not seem to be convinced.

In the early election exclamations that they occasionally expressed after the local elections, the party whose chairman did not even think of running for office, this time instead of remaining passive like the last time, Mansur Yavaş started to give signals to his party. Although he continued his old cautious attitude with the statements of “ If my party nominates a candidate, I will be a presidential candidate ”, this time being asked these questions more consciously or unconsciously has already increased the factionalism within the party.

On the other hand, Ekrem İmamoğlu has not refrained from making open moves to increase his dominance within the party in the process that has continued from the congress period to the present day. Although he wanted to be nominated in the previous election, he had to bow to Kılıçdaroğlu's pressure. However, this time, he showed up in the squares as if to make everyone feel that he did not see a party leader who could put pressure on him. He has already started to take the cheering group he formed with the IMM staff to the meetings and rallies he goes to outside the city.

In addition to what happened, the fact that former Izmir Metropolitan Municipality Mayor Tunç Soyer recently declared his intention to become the party chairman seemed to increase the number of poles within the party. However, it was clearly seen in the Party Assembly elections that Soyer's influence within the party was not very high.

In this case, the change expressed by the party chairman seems to have served no purpose other than drawing the reaction of the base with statements that sometimes draw reaction within the party. Although the administration in the CHP has changed, it is clear that the chaos within the party has not ended and has even intensified.

Even Cemil Tugay, who became the Mayor of Izmir Metropolitan Municipality with the support of Özgür Özel, is still trying to eliminate the team from the Kılıçdaroğlu era, while the pollution in the Gulf of Izmir seems to have taken a backseat despite all these problems. Therefore, there has been a change in the party, but the chaos has not yet been resolved. When this is the case, both his own base does not listen to the call for early elections, and the arguments put forward by the party staff do not find any response in the public opinion.

It became clear in the political process that Özel came to power that change cannot be achieved by just talking about change. Although the Animal Rights bill occupied our country's agenda for months, only one bill came from the CHP. While even HUDA-PAR, which everyone reacted to, presented a very constructive bill, and the IYI Party contributed to the process with two bills, the main opposition party's attempt to turn the issue into street demonstrations with a 3-article bill was perceived as nothing more than a manifestation of the " same old, same old " mentality by our people.

Again, while so much progress has been made in the Somalia mandate, especially in terms of developing our military and economic activities in that region, the disastrous Blue Homeland comments of the Chairman's advisor could not change the opinion of the undecided voters that the expectation of change towards the CHP was again nothing more than rhetoric.

Regarding Gaza, especially at the beginning, a clichéd opposition statement was made, lacking depth and saying “ what are we doing ” with Hamas opposition. When this discourse did not hold, attempts to turn the tide by suddenly switching to “ you are doing business with Israel ” and “ you do not support Palestine ” discourses could not reduce the negative impact on undecided voters.

The fact that the person who said, " Why am I mourning because one Arab died ?" and who was a representative of the Hamas leader and called 50% of the country idiots, was present as a protocol guest next to the party chairman at a historically important opening such as the Izmir Fair clearly showed that there was only a change of seats in the CHP and that the mentality had not changed yet.

İmamoğlu, who felt the need to declare his candidacy approximately 3 years before the elections in order to cover up the results of his investigation for approximately 2 months, has announced to the country that Özel is a figurehead leader just like Kılıçdaroğlu. Even though Kılıçdaroğlu has made his candidacy accepted by his alliance in the 2023 elections despite many reactions, the fact that Özel did not even make any effort in this regard has clearly revealed who won the Congress thanks to him.

Although many more examples can be added to the list; following the emergence of the İmamoğlu criminal organization, we came across a political party leader who encouraged people to take to the streets and made people in the rally area in Maltepe vote on whether to attack the police station or not.

During this process, where not even one member of the opposition refrained from vouching for İmamoğlu and his crew, the CHP wanted to carry out the second Gezi attempt by asking for support from Europe and the US. However, due to the sensitivity of the countries in the region and the world regarding Turkey, our developing defense technology and our having a say in many issues in the region, this effort did not receive any response. In contrast, the opposition leader did not hesitate to show clearly who he was really loyal to by openly reproaching the leader of the UK Labor Party and asking, “ Why are we not being supported? ”

As a result, it can be clearly observed that the long-standing leadership problem in the CHP has not been resolved. Although this seems positive for the government, unfortunately, as our President has said, it continues to cause us to be deprived of the contributions that a qualified opposition can make to the country.

The photo in the image of the article

" https://www.yeniakit.com.tr/kart/haber/chpde-catlak-buyuyor-chpli-isim-eylem-baslatiyor-485883.html "

Quoted from the address.