CHP’s Özel holds talks with Key Party leader

ANKARA

Main opposition leader Özgür Özel met with Key Party leader Yavuz Ağıralioğlu on Dec. 11 at the Republican People’s Party (CHP) headquarters in the capital Ankara.

The two leaders and their delegations discussed major issues on Türkiye's political agenda, according to party officials. The meeting was a return visit to Özel’s June stop at the Key Party office.

Ağıralioğlu founded the Key Party in October 2024 after resigning from the İYİ (Good) Party the previous year over its electoral cooperation with the CHP.

After the opposition’s defeat, Özel succeeded longtime CHP leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu and went on to secure notable gains in the 2024 local polls.

The meeting came a day after Özel held one of the CHP’s twice-weekly rallies late on Dec. 10 in Istanbul’s Çatalca district, where he criticized the government’s economic policies and President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s absence from parliament as 2026 budget debates began.

"May God not deprive anyone of the courage to defend the budget they made for the nation in the parliament... Of course, he cannot come, because there is a 2.7 trillion [Turkish] lira deficit on the very first page of the budget," he said.

"Of course he cannot come, he's the European champion in high inflation, the European champion in unemployment, the European champion in poverty, the European champion in income inequality."

Özel denounced Türkyie's reliance on indirect taxes, allegedly accounting for over 60 percent of total revenue, and vowed to reform what he called an unfair system.

"[It is] the tax that doesn't distinguish between rich and poor. The tax paid equally by the factory owner and the factory guard... The tax paid when one buys fuel for their luxury jeeps, the other for their motorcycle,” he said.

He vowed to overhaul the tax system if the CHP comes to power. “The people's power will come, and we will turn this tax system upside down," he said. "We will take more from those who earn more and less from those who earn less."