İYİ (Good) Party leader Meral Akşener has called on President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to remove his son-in-law from the position of finance minister due to poor economic performance.
Akşener, in a speech to her parliamentary group on Tuesday, criticized Erdoğan’s decision to fire the central bank governor over his refusal to decrease interest rates.
“One of the best structural reforms would be the independence of the central bank, another achievement before [Erdoğan’s party] becomes history,” Akşener told deputies.
After his victory in the June 2018 presidential and parliamentary elections, Erdoğan appointed Berat Albayrak, his son-in-law and former energy minister, as treasury and finance minister, a move that drew heavy criticism from the global money managers as well as the Turkish opposition.
Since Albayrak took office, Turkey has experienced a currency crisis and arguably a recession stemming from high inflation and unemployment.
Akşener in 2017 quit the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), Erdoğan’s ally, and later formed an alliance with the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) for the parliamentary elections in 2018 and local elections on March 31.
In her speech she also claimed to have received threats from MHP leader Devlet Bahçeli in the course of establishing the İYİ Party.