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Voted out after 13 years: Kemal Kilicdaroğlu

Photo: ALP EREN KAYA / CHP PRESS OFFICE / HANDOUT / EPA

He has clung to his post for a long time – but now Kemal Kilicdaroğlu has to vacate the chairmanship of the CHP. After its bitter defeat in the presidential election at the end of May, Turkey's largest opposition party has dismissed its long-time leader. In a contested vote at the party congress of the left-wing nationalist CHP on Sunday, the 74-year-old Kilicdaroğlu was replaced by the comparatively politically inexperienced pharmacist Özgür Özel. However, Özel was supported by the popular mayor of Istanbul, Ekrem Imamoğlu. To the annoyance of many CHP members and voters, Kilicdaroglu refused to resign as party leader after his election defeat.

Since the election, the CHP has been internally divided and in deep crisis. Many supporters accuse Kilicdaroğlu of having missed the best chance in years to overthrow Islamic-conservative President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in the election in May.

Defeated Kilicdaroğlu speaks of "stab in the back"

Kilicdaroğlu had succeeded in forging an alliance of opposition from the far right to the Kurds. But it had begun to falter a few months before the election. Despite the great dissatisfaction among the population, also due to high inflation, Erdoğan won the run-off election in the end. The disappointment of the opposition was huge.

Now Özgür Özel takes over the CHP leadership. The 49-year-old won the last round of voting on Sunday in the heated atmosphere of the party congress by 812 votes to 536, after presenting himself as the candidate of "change". However, the vote on the party leader was less about political content and more about personalities. Kilicdaroğlu had denounced the attempts to depose him as a "stab in the back".

Özel worked for a long time as a pharmacist in the rather liberal tourist city of Izmir in the west of the country. He then became president of the country's pharmacists' association before being elected to parliament in 2011. Local elections will be held in Turkey next year.

Originally, Kilicdaroğlu's rival Imamoğlu was supposed to run against Erdoğan as a CHP candidate in the presidential election. However, last December, the mayor of Istanbul was sentenced to almost three years in prison for insulting a public official. After he appealed, he was able to remain in office, but he was excluded from the presidential election.

beb/AFP