Erdogan wants to eliminate important opponent Imamoglu

Created: 12/16/2022, 1:27 p.m

By: Erkan Pehlivan

Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu (CHP) was sentenced to prison and a ban on politics.

Erdogan clears his dangerous opponents out of the way.

Istanbul - Since a criminal court sentenced the mayor of Istanbul, Ekrem Imamoglu (CHP), to more than two years in prison and a political ban on Wednesday for insulting civil servants, protests in Turkey and abroad have increased.

Imamoglu has appealed the verdict and is allowed to remain in office as mayor for the time being.

The 52-year-old politician is being traded in the 2023 elections as a possible opponent of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's opposition alliance "Six Table".

Erdogan wants Kilicdaroglu as an opponent

Critics see the verdict as politically motivated.

“Had the head of the CHP, Kemal Kilicdaroglu, called the members of the High Electoral Committee YSK, the members of the Constitutional Court and Erdogan idiots, would the presidential palace have taken him to court and imposed a political ban on him?

no

After all, Erdogan wants Kilicdaroglu as his opponent,” says political scientist and Turkey expert Prof. Savas Genc in an interview with Fr.de from Ippen.MEDIA.

In contrast to Imamoglu, Kilicdaroglu is considered a weak opponent.

CHP also voted to invade northern Syria

The consultant for the Middle East at the Society for Threatened Peoples (GfbV), Dr.

Kamal Sido.

"Imamoglu is a threat to Erdogan and his AKP.

He could overthrow Erdogan in next year's elections and he doesn't want to risk that.

So he issues a political ban here, ”said Sido in an interview with our editors.

But here one should not forget the decisions of the governing party AKP in recent years, which were also supported by the CHP.

Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu © IMAGO/Onur Dogman

“Erdogan is undoubtedly bad.

But we forget here that Imamoglu's CHP is also anti-Kurdish.

She voted in parliament to lift the immunity of HDP MPs and also for an invasion of Turkish soldiers in northern Syria.” Kurdish Afrin has been under the control of the Turkish military and their allied Syrian jihadists since 2018.

While the proportion of the Kurdish population in Afrin was over 90 percent until 2018, it has now fallen to less than 30 percent.

Judge in the Imamoglu trial Member of the AKP-affiliated legal association

The verdict against Imamoglu does not surprise former judge at the Court of Cassation (Yargitay), Kemal Karanfil.

“The judge who handed down the verdict against the Istanbul mayor is Mehdi Komsul and belongs to a pro-government bloc of prosecutors and judges called the 'Unity in the Judiciary' YGB (Turkish: Yargıda Birlik Derneği).

The bloc was formed in 2014 to take control of the High Council of Judges and Prosecutors HSYK,” Karanfil said in an interview.

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The body decides on the judges and prosecutors in the courts, not only on their appointment, but also on their dismissal and punishment.

Among other things, the prosecutors and judges were promised higher salaries, says Karanfil, when they switch to the pro-government camp.

As a result, the association has also managed to gain the majority and thus control over the HSYK with its members.

The pro-government Association of Prosecutors and Judges YGB was established in response to the December 2013 corruption scandal.

35 businessmen from the Erdogan area were arrested.

The President of Turkey himself was also targeted by the investigators at the time.

All those imprisoned were released a few weeks later and the investigating police officers and public prosecutors were withdrawn from the case, and many of them were later arrested themselves.

Erdogan called the corruption investigations of the time a "coup attempt".

Imamoglu is the third opponent to be eliminated

Should Imamoglu's appeal come to nothing, Erdogan has eliminated another opponent.

This has already been achieved with the former co-chairman of the pro-Kurdish HDP, Selahattin Demirtas.

The opposition figure was arrested with several other Kurdish politicians in 2016 and has been in prison ever since.

The CHP politician Canan Kaftancioglu was also eliminated as an opponent in May of this year.

Kaftancioglu was sentenced to almost five years in prison and a ban on politics.

However, she does not have to serve the prison sentence for the time being.

(Erkan Pehlivan)