PM questions CHP leader's drinking habits

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan accused main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu of following incoherent policies, using Kılıçdaroğlu’s own remarks about drinking alcohol as a rhetorical weapon.

“I really wonder what they are drinking. In an interview, the CHP leader spoke about what he drinks. Apparently they drink rakı [a traditional alcoholic beverage] with water. You know I’m from Rize, though I was born and grew up in Istanbul. I say that if they go on drinking like this, they would of course end up calling Rize’s ‘tulum’ a ‘gayda,’” Erdoğan said on March 19, speaking at his party’s parliamentary group meeting.

On Kılıçdaroğlu’s official Twitter account, the traditional “tulum” musical instrument of the Black Sea region was recently referred to as a “gayda,” the Turkish name for the Scottish bagpipe.