Supporters of Özgür Özel, the ousted leader of Turkey’s main opposition party, said Monday they would ask a court to force an extraordinary party congress if the court-installed administration of former chairman Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu does not call a leadership vote within four days, Turkish Minute reported.
The move opens a new legal front in the battle for control of the Republican People’s Party (CHP), the party established by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founder of modern Turkey, and now the main opposition force against President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
The CHP has been in turmoil since an Ankara appeals court on May 21 annulled the 2023 congress that elected Özel chairman and restored Kılıçdaroğlu and his former administration to party leadership.
The ruling removed Özel and the party organs elected under his leadership as an interim measure pending appeal and returned the party to its pre-2023 leadership structure.
Özel’s camp says the court-installed administration is required under party bylaws to call an extraordinary congress after delegates submitted notarized signatures demanding a vote.
According to Turkish media reports, Özel’s supporters delivered 833 notarized delegate signatures to CHP headquarters on June 17, along with separate requests from İstanbul delegates, bringing the claimed total to more than 1,100.
CHP bylaws allow an extraordinary congress to be called by the chairman, by the Party Assembly or by one-fifth of congress delegates through notarized signatures. The bylaws also require that the congress be held within 45 days after a valid delegate application is submitted.
Gül Çiftci, the CHP official in Özel’s camp responsible for election and party law, said the threshold had been met and that Kılıçdaroğlu’s administration had no discretion to ignore the demand.
She said if the administration fails to act within four days, Özel’s camp will ask a civil court to establish that the delegate will has been obstructed and that the party bylaws have not been applied.
The challenge matters because Özel’s camp believes a vote by party delegates would restore him to the chairmanship and undercut the practical effect of the appeals court ruling.
Kılıçdaroğlu’s side has argued that the CHP cannot hold an extraordinary congress until the annulment judgment becomes final.
His administration has instead begun preparations for an ordinary congress process, which could take several months.
The split has produced two rival centers of power inside the CHP.
Kılıçdaroğlu controls party headquarters under the court order, while Özel controls the parliamentary group and retains the support of most CHP lawmakers, provincial organizations and congress delegates.
CHP’s 49 overseas branch chairs added to the pressure Monday, issuing a joint statement in response to a letter from Kılıçdaroğlu and saying they rejected being his “comrades.”
The branch chairs said they stood with Özel and jailed İstanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, whom the CHP selected as its presidential candidate before his arrest.
The statement accused Kılıçdaroğlu’s camp of entering the party headquarters with police, tear gas, rubber bullets and batons and said the party’s future should be determined by the will of its members and organization, not by closed-door decisions.
The leadership fight comes as criminal investigations targeting CHP-run municipalities continue to grow.
Thirty-nine people detained in an investigation targeting the Adalar Municipality in İstanbul were sent to court on Monday for a decision.
The detainees include Adalar Mayor Ali Ercan Akpolat, his deputies and municipal staff.
Prosecutors accuse municipal officials of bribery, extortion, forgery of official documents, abuse of office, forming and leading a criminal organization and violating Turkey’s law on the protection of cultural and natural assets.
The investigation centers on allegations that officials allowed illegal construction and improper licensing in the Adalar district, a group of islands in the Sea of Marmara that includes protected natural and archaeological sites.
Authorities said 47 suspects were named in the investigation and 42 were detained in raids carried out in İstanbul, Kocaeli, Rize and Sivas.
Three detainees were released on prosecutors’ orders, while 39 were sent to court after police questioning.
A separate investigation targeting the CHP-run Silifke Municipality in the southern province of Mersin also reached the courthouse Monday.
Silifke Mayor Mustafa Turgut and 18 other people were sent to court after being detained in a June 19 operation.
Prosecutors accuse the suspects of forming a criminal organization, bid rigging and bribery.
The Silifke investigation concerns alleged irregularities in municipal tenders, direct procurement, festivals, advertising, printing, vehicle rentals, food purchases and zoning procedures.
The suspects include municipal executives, employees and people doing business with the municipality.
No court decision had been announced in either the Adalar or Silifke cases at the time of publication.
The CHP says the investigations are part of a campaign to reverse the results of the March 2024 local elections, when it defeated Erdoğan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) across Turkey and won control of the country’s largest cities.
A running tally published by T24 and updated Monday said 34 CHP-run municipalities, including six metropolitan municipalities, have faced operations, investigations, detentions, arrests or administrative sanctions since the 2024 local elections.
The same tally said 28 mayors have been jailed at some point and that 21 CHP mayors were still in jail after the latest arrests.
The municipal investigations began with Esenyurt, a district of İstanbul, in October 2024 and expanded after İmamoğlu was arrested in March 2025.
İmamoğlu, the elected mayor of Turkey’s largest city and Erdoğan’s main political rival, remains in pretrial detention on charges of leading a criminal organization involved in bribery, fraud and tender rigging.
He denies the accusations and says the case was designed to remove him from the next presidential race.
The CHP says the prosecution of İmamoğlu and the removal of Özel’s leadership are parts of the same effort to weaken the opposition before the next national election.
The CHP lost another mayor Monday when Levent Koç, the mayor of Haymana, a district of Ankara, resigned from the party and joined Erdoğan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) later the same day. Turkish media reports said Erdoğan pinned the AKP badge on Koç at a party meeting in Ankara.
Koç had been named in reports claiming that several CHP district mayors in Ankara could switch to the AKP. The reports drew more attention after Koç and Gölbaşı Mayor Yakup Odabaşı met Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change Minister Murat Kurum and after Haymana Municipality removed banners featuring Ankara Mayor Mansur Yavaş, one of the opposition’s strongest potential presidential candidates.
BBC’s Turkish service reported earlier Monday that 16 mayors elected from the CHP had joined the AKP since the March 2024 local elections. Koç’s switch raises that number to 17.
A separate report Monday added another layer to the political pressure around İmamoğlu.
The Evrensel news website reported that an Islamic State suspect brought to Turkey after being captured in Syria told police that members of the group had once discussed a plan to assassinate İmamoğlu.
The reported statement said the alleged plan was shelved before the preparation stage.
The report has not been independently confirmed and was not directly linked to the CHP leadership case or the municipal corruption investigations.
The next immediate test in the CHP crisis is whether Kılıçdaroğlu’s administration calls the extraordinary congress demanded by Özel’s supporters.
If it refuses, the dispute will return to court, this time with Özel’s side asking the judiciary to enforce a delegate vote against the administration that a court installed.
