Following the election of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan as chairman of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) on Sunday, Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım was elected chairman of the AKP parliamentary group on Wednesday.
Yıldırım was elected by garnering 300 deputies’ votes during a closed session of the AKP parliamentary group meeting.
Bülent Turan, vice chairman of the AKP parliamentary group, said on Tuesday that since the law does not allow President Erdoğan to become chairman of the AKP parliamentary group, the party would elect a new group chairman, and they proposed Yıldırım for the post.
Following a referendum in April that introduced an executive presidency in Turkey, President Erdoğan was elected as the new chairman of the AKP after a 998-day absence from the party during the party’s third extraordinary congress held at the Ankara Sports Hall on Sunday.
Before the election, Erdoğan reshuffled the AKP’s Central Decision and Executive Board (MKYK), with 19 members of the 50-seat board changed. Prime Minister Yıldırım, who handed over party leadership to Erdoğan, became “acting chairman” of the MKYK after an amendment to the AKP bylaws.