Özgür Özel and his close aides have begun working to craft a new road map after a court has removed him from the chairmanship of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) and reinstated former leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu.
Özel held meetings on May 25 with the heads of the CHP’s provincial branches and mayors at the parliament in a bid to strategize the next steps they will take in the coming period.
The move came after Özel and his supporters had to evacuate the CHP’s headquarters after the police intervention on May 24 in line with Kılıçdaroğlu’s appeal to the office of the Ankara governor.
Since then, Özel chose his office at the parliament as his new place of work.
“We are going to meet with the members of our central decision-making body as well as with our deputy parliamentary group leaders. We will plan what to do next,” he told a group of reporters on May 25.
Özel said he will spend the first days of the Eid al-Adha in his hometown, the western province of Manisa, and informed that his aides will also go to their hometowns to continue their meet their voters. They are expected to resume their political activities after the Eid al-Adha.
HH DEM Party team meets Özel at parliament
In the meantime, a delegation from the Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) under the leadership of co-leader Tuncer Bakırhan paid a visit to Özel at the parliament to express his support.
“On the first day of our work at the parliament, we had a very important visitor. This historic visit of solidarity was very important to us. We thank them very much,” Özel said.
For his part Bakırhan underlined that the DEM Party openly condemns the use of force by the police on the main opposition’s headquarters.
“To describe with one word: It was shameful and unacceptable,” Bakırhan said.
“This decision of the court has once again put the Turkish democracy in a political crisis,” he said, expressing his hope that the CHP will be able to overcome this problem through a convention that it will hold peacefully.
HH Kılıçdaroğlu will go to party HQ on May 28
Meanwhile, Kılıçdaroğlu is expected to go to the headquarters of the CHP on May 28 to greet the party members and meet the staff, his spokesperson Atakan Sönmez told reporters on May 25.
Kılıçdaroğlu was reinstated as the chairman of the CHP through a court decision last week.
Sönmez informed that Kılıçdaroğlu continued his work from his home on May 25 as he is planning to convene the Party Assembly in the coming days.
He will appoint a new executive board from the members of the Party Assembly although some of the members have already announced that they won’t take part in the new party brass.
