Istanbul mayor Ekrem Imamoglu of the secular opposition party CHP was sentenced on Wednesday to more than two years and seven months in prison for insulting members of the electoral commission. The court also banned him from engaging in politics, which could lead to his removal from office. Imamoglu is seen as a possible challenger to President Erdogan in parliamentary and presidential elections scheduled for next year.
After the verdict, Imamoglu was hailed as a hero by tens of thousands of supporters who gathered at the headquarters of the Istanbul Municipality. “The verdict proves that there is no justice in Turkey,” he said in a fiery speech, sounding like a presidential candidate. Imamoglu said he can win next year’s presidential election with the support of the people who helped him win in Istanbul in 2019. “Ekrem president,” his supporters chanted.
The conviction stems from a comment Imamoglu made after the 2019 Istanbul mayoral election, when his narrow victory was canceled by the electoral commission after President Erdogan’s losing AK party claimed irregularities. New elections were held and Imamoglu won with a larger majority. “Those who canceled the March 31 elections are idiots,” he said at the time.
Landslide
Imamoglu’s victory marked a political earthquake in Turkey. It was the first time in 25 years that Erdogan’s AKP (or the Islamist parties from which the AKP emerged) lost power in the country’s largest city.
In 2019, the architect of Imamoglu’s election victory, Canan Kaftancioglu, was already sentenced to nine years and eight months in prison for insulting the president and terror-related charges. That was converted to four years and eleven months in May of this year.
According to Imamoglu, the trial against him is designed to prevent him from running against Erdogan in next year’s elections. He is expected to appeal the verdict. It will take some time for the higher court to issue a final verdict. In the meantime, Imamoglu could be put forward as a presidential candidate by the opposition. Opinion polls suggest he would beat Erdogan if elections were held now.
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Together against Erdogan
The six opposition parties that will unite against Erdogan will meet on Thursday, Imamoglu said in his post-verdict speech. Next to him was Meral Aksener, the leader of the nationalist IYI Party, the second largest opposition party after the CHP. She referred to Erdogan’s political career, who himself received a prison sentence and a political ban before becoming prime minister in 2003. She suggested that she will support Imamoglu’s candidacy.
Notable absent from the rally was CHP leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu, who is in Berlin for a conference on artificial intelligence. It seemed in recent months that he himself wanted to become the opposition’s presidential candidate. The big question is whether he will change his mind under these circumstances.
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