İstanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu and Ankara Mayor Mansur Yavaş from the Republican People’s Party (CHP) have started to respond to the need for opposition felt in some segments of Turkish society, Hürriyet daily columnist Abdülkadir Selvi wrote on Thursday.
In his column where he recounted a conversation with Hilmi Daşdemir, chairman of the Optimar polling company, he said polls show that fewer Turks are now expressing opinions in favor of the establishment of new political parties.
A total of 34.6 percent of people polled in February 2019 said new parties were needed in the country, dropping to 14.9 percent in November.
Selvi said people who are of this opinion do not make up a homogenous group as they come from different ideological backgrounds.
He imputed the fall in the demand for new parties to the popularity of İmamoğlu and Yavaş, who won in the country’s two largest cities in last year’s local elections.
After taking office the two mayors exposed extravagant spending and corruption by previous municipal administrations run by mayors who were elected from the ranks of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP).
İmamoğlu was recently embroiled in a row with AKP officials over his fierce opposition to the government’s proposed Kanal İstanbul project, which involves the construction of an artificial sea-level waterway bisecting the European side of İstanbul.