The CHP and long-lasting problems

Bugün’s Ahmet Taşgetiren says Kılıçdaroğlu’s leadership adventure is seeing very interesting developments as none of the figures who helped him ascend to the party’s top spot are now with him. “Gürsel Tekin made Kılıçdaroğlu popular in İstanbul [when he ran in the 2009 municipal elections]. Now, he is not with Kılıçdaroğlu. [Former CHP Secretary-General] Önder Sav was with Kılıçdaroğlu when he ousted [long-standing CHP leader Deniz] Baykal. Now, Sav is not with Kılıçdaroğlu, either. Where will these developments lead to at the CHP?” asks Taşgetiren. In his view, all these developments and never-ending intra-party conflicts indicate that the CHP is an exhausted and outdated party. “It produced a grass roots for itself in a political greenhouse during the single-party era. The party continued to exist thanks to support from the children of those very grass roots, but most members of the party’s voter base have died. Even if their children stand up for the legacy of their forefathers, they have difficulty in doing so. The reason for this is because the CHP lacks the capacity to deal with Turkey’s problems,” he explains.

Tekin’s resignation has prompted Sabah’s Hasan Celal Güzel to focus on the problem of the opposition gap in Turkey, which he thinks is one of the major problems in the country. He says CHP members always bicker and do not let new ideas flourish in the party and therefore fail to produce solutions to the country’s problems. As to what should be done regarding the opposition gap, he says the CHP should immediately end the conflicts taking place within the party, which he thinks is a must not only for itself but also for Turkish democracy.

Another Sabah columnist, Sevilay Yükselir, who focuses on the reasons behind Tekin’s resignation, says it is because Tekin wants to run for the CHP’s top post. She says that under the current structure of party delegates, Tekin knows he has no chance of becoming the party’s leader but wants the public to become familiar with his name and discuss the prospects of him being an alternative to the current CHP leader.