Main opposition CHP leader slams Erdoğan over anti-opposition remarks

ANKARA

Main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu has slammed President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan after he complained about what he called the “CHP mentality,” expressing his concerns over an imminent callous campaign against his party. 

“He [Erdoğan] claims he will dissolve the CHP. But he’s preparing his own end by saying this,” Kılıçdaroğlu told a group of reporters on May 6. 

In a harsh statement earlier this week, Erdoğan said Turkey had long been “suffering from the CHP mentality” and it’s about time that it’s “dissolved.”

When asked about Erdoğan’s remarks, Kılıçdaroğlu said: “A campaign against the CHP will be launched by Erdoğan and all his institutions in the coming period.” 

Erdoğan is planning to attack the CHP because he cannot digest the right views expressed by the opposition, the CHP leader said.  “But he will not succeed.”

According to Kılıçdaroğlu, a recent debate over a new military intervention could be the government’s way to distract the people’s attention from current economic and other problems.   

“Erdoğan is, in fact, aware that he is losing, and his words have no influence on the people. He has to prevent losing votes, so he needs an enemy for this. And he sees the CHP as the enemy,” Kılıçdaroğlu said. 

The CHP has never endorsed military interventions and always supported democracy, he said.

“It has always been the CHP which has suffered most from the coup d’états. All the former CHP chairs were imprisoned [by the coup plotters] in the course of interventions. All the properties of the party were confiscated,” he stated. 

“Erdoğan is trying to make it look like that he is defending the democracy and the CHP is not through mainstream media. But people won’t buy this,” Kılıçdaroğlu stressed. 

“How can one talk about democracy in a country where so many journalists are imprisoned? Erdoğan constantly claims that he is democrat and defends democracy. We believe that he has nothing to do with democracy and that his rule is an authoritarian one,” he added.