Turkey’s Opposition to Declare Presidential Candidate on Monday

Taylan Bilgic
·1 min read
1
  • Oops!
    Something went wrong.
    Please try again later.

(Bloomberg) --

Most Read from Bloomberg

Turkey’s main opposition alliance will declare who will compete against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Monday, ahead of parliamentary and presidential elections on May 14.

Turkish stocks dropped sharply on Friday after disagreements among the group of parties sparked fears about whether they would be able to choose a candidate to challenge the president in the upcoming elections.

The leaders of the alliance said in a statement late Saturday that they would announce their choice on Monday. The most likely pick to be the presidential candidate is Kemal Kilicdaroglu, who currently leads the alliance and is also head of the Republican People’s Party.

The group is made up of six parties, but IYI Party leader Meral Aksener may pull her right-wing party out after criticizing the alliance earlier this week. Aksener had proposed the mayors of Istanbul or Ankara as candidates but was rebuffed by other party leaders.

The group also includes the Future Party, led by former premier Ahmet Davutoglu, the DEVA party, led by former economy czar Ali Babacan and the Felicity Party, an Islamist group led by Temel Karamollaoglu.

Turkey’s Erdogan Criticizes Rivals Over Candidate Squabbles

President Erdogan called for presidential and parliamentary elections to go ahead in May, quashing speculation the vote would be postponed following deadly earthquakes that took tens of thousands of lives and impacted 11 provinces.

Most Read from Bloomberg Businessweek

©2023 Bloomberg L.P.