Turkish court ousts leader of main opposition party
Key takeaways
- Ankara court overturns results of leadership election won by Republican People’s Party head Ozgur Ozel.
- The case was seen as a test of Turkiye’s shaky balance between democracy and increasingly centralised power, and the ruling may throw the opposition into further disarray and possible infighting.
- The CHP rejected the ruling as an “attempted coup”, while the government – which denies criticism that it uses courts to target political opponents – said it renewed Turks’ faith in the rule of law.
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Ankara court overturns results of leadership election won by Republican People’s Party head Ozgur Ozel.
xwhatsapp-strokecopylinkgoogle Add Al Jazeera on Googleinfo Ozgur Ozel, leader of Republican People's Party (CHP), addresses a news conference at the party headquarters in Ankara, Turkiye, on May 21, 2026 [Adem Altan/AFP]By AFP and Reuters Published On 22 May 202622 May 2026A court in Turkiye has annulled the 2023 leadership election of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) in a sharp escalation against the country’s embattled opposition.
It is the latest in a string of moves targeting the CHP, Turkiye’s oldest political faction that won a huge victory over President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ruling AK Party in the 2024 local elections and has been rising in the polls.