Turkish President Erdoğan targets CHP’s Ankara mayor candidate

ANKARA

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has continued targeting main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) Ankara mayoral candidate Mansur Yavaş, who he accuses of having committed forgery in the past.

“Now, my nation has found out that [the CHP’s] Ankara mayoral candidate has committed a check fraud. This person is also a tax evader. How can such a man become a candidate for Ankara? This scandal is too large to cover up. Running away from questions instead of honestly answering them will do nobody any good,” Erdoğan said at the opening ceremony of a huge amusement park in the capital on March 20, referring to a recent lawsuit Yavaş is involved in that concerns a counterfeit check.

“As the People’s Alliance, our joint candidate is our brother Mehmet Özhaseki. We will not hand Ankara over to a random person, to someone who forged signatures on checks. We want Ankara to continue to be governed by good people,” he added, referring to the alliance of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP).

Erdoğan also once again claimed that Turkey’s opposition parties are taking orders from Qandil, mountains in northern Iraq where the headquarters of the outlawed PKK are. The PKK is listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey, the EU and the U.S.

But the CHP says the allegations are part of a smear campaign by Erdoğan’s party which is afraid of losing the local elections to the opposition.

“When you do some research on the [Nation’s Alliance], you see that they do negotiations with the separatist terrorist organization. They can no longer hide their dirty cooperation and bloody negotiations. This alliance has everything except patriotism and nationalism,” he said, insinuating the opposition alliance of the CHP and İYİ (Good) Party.

“Truths will emerge even if you attempt to hide them,” he added.

The president said the AKP supported a politics not based on “quarrel” but on “brotherhood” and “love.”

Erdoğan inaugurates massive amusement park in Ankara

The president also inaugurated what he called Europe’s biggest theme park, named the “Ankapark,” in the capital, spanning a 1.3 million-square-meter area.

“Ankapark will generate 50 million Turkish Liras [around $9.1 million] in revenue annually. It is also an environment-friendly project. I would like to thank our former [Ankara] mayor Melih Gökçek for his contributions in realizing this project,” Erdoğan said.

The park hosts 2 million species of plants and trees as well as a five-kilometer (3.1-mile) rail system and a parking lot for 6,800 cars.

The project was first realized by Gökçek, but had stirred controversies for its high costs and the money spent.