CHP head calls for snap elections for resigned and dismissed mayors in Turkey

ANKARA

Main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu has called for early elections for the cities where mayors have either recently been dismissed or pressured to resign, vowing that the CHP is ready to “give legislative support for any necessary changes.”

“Let’s hold a snap election for the mayors who were either resigned or dismissed. Let’s show respect for the national will,” Kılıçdaroğlu said on Nov. 7, addressing his party group at parliament.

Reiterating his earlier call on the government to bring forward all three elections due to be held in 2019 in a bid to “save the honor of democracy,” the CHP leader said he was now “softening his call so they do not get afraid.”

Speaking after the resignation of ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) mayors of provinces including Ankara, Istanbul, Bursa and Balıkesir, Kılıçdaroğlu said “50 percent of people in Turkey are now governed by somebody they did not even elect.”

He pledged that the CHP is willing to give all necessary legislative support for any regulation needed to hold snap elections in the districts where the mayoralties are vacant.

Kılıçdaroğlu referred to the constitutional article stipulating snap parliamentary elections in the event that five percent of all parliamentary representative posts are vacant, saying that a similar regulation can be made for mayoralties.

“Let’s craft a special regulation. Let us give all kinds of support. Why are you afraid?” he said.

The AKP recently reshuffled its party organization ahead of the 2019 triple elections, trying to avoid what AKP leader and President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan calls “metal fatigue.”

Erdoğan says the moves are part of “regeneration efforts” in the party.