By Huseyin Hayatsever
ANKARA, July 21 (Reuters) – Turkey’s opposition leader, Ozgur Ozel, said he would form a new party to challenge Tayyip Erdogan, a political splintering that could boost the president’s prospects of extending his 23-year rule at the next elections.
A court in May ousted Ozel as chairman of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which has already faced an unprecedented and contested legal crackdown since 2024 that left it weaker. Yet if Erdogan is to run for one more presidential term, elections would need to come earlier than currently scheduled in 2028.
WHEN ARE TURKEY’S NEXT ELECTIONS?
Presidential and parliamentary elections happen every five years and the next are scheduled for May 14, 2028. The president and parliament are each able to call for an earlier vote.
WHAT IS ERDOGAN’S SITUATION?
Erdogan first served as prime minister and was later elected president in 2014 under its then parliamentary system. After a 2017 referendum brought in a new executive presidency system, he was re-elected as president in 2018 and 2023. Though he has reached his two-term limit under the presidential system, the constitution allows him to run again if parliament calls an early election during his last term.
HOW CAN PARLIAMENT CALL AN EARLY ELECTION?
A three-fifths majority of parliament — 360 of 600 lawmakers — is required to call an early election. Erdogan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and its allies have 328 seats, so the conservative alliance needs 32 more votes from other parties, which could be a challenge.
The secular and centrist CHP has 135 seats with most expected to shift to Ozel’s new party; the leftist pro-Kurdish DEM Party and its allies have 63; the nationalist IYI Party has 29; while smaller opposition parties have 26. There are 11 independent MPs.
HOW DO PARTIES VIEW EARLY ELECTIONS?
Erdogan’s AKP and his nationalist ally MHP say they have no plans for early elections, saying they will be held “on time.” AKP officials have also said that any vote before May 14, 2028 would count as an early election, allowing Erdogan to run.
The CHP’s ousted leader, Ozel, has repeatedly called for an early vote, in part so that voters can weigh in on the legal crackdown on his party. But he has also said it cannot happen too close to the scheduled date in 2028, after which Erdogan would need to leave.
While at least 90 of the CHP’s 135 lawmakers back Ozel, who resigned from the party on Tuesday, it is unclear whether the court-reinstated party chairman Kemal Kilicdaroglu would back an early election call.
Some analysts say the ruling alliance might seek support for an early election from the DEM Party. While it has long sharply opposed Erdogan’s nationalist and Islamist-rooted AKP, DEM has since late 2024 helped facilitate steps toward peace between the Turkish state and the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
ARE THERE OTHER OPTIONS FOR ERDOGAN?
There is a more complicated and risky way for Erdogan to run again: a constitutional amendment. It could come into force immediately if 400 lawmakers in the 600-seat parliament back it, though that is seen as a stretch for Erdogan’s alliance.
Alternatively, a constitutional amendment can be put to a referendum if backed by at least 360 MPs. Polls suggest Turks are split on the issue, a risk for the government. Though the CHP has previously rejected any constitutional change that would benefit Erdogan, its new splintering could sway some MPs.
Erdogan’s nationalist ally and MHP leader Devlet Bahceli has said a constitutional amendment should be considered but the ruling alliance has not put forward any draft constitutional change.
(Reporting by Huseyin Hayatsever; Editing by Jonathan Spicer and Jon Boyle)
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