 Party has been left with 32 seats in the Turkish parliament after 11 lawmakers from the party resigned mainly due to internal fractures and challenges in the aftermath of its defeat in the March local elections.){kind=link}
The nationalist opposition İYİ (Good) Party has been left with 32 seats in the Turkish parliament after 11 lawmakers from the party resigned mainly due to internal fractures and challenges in the aftermath of its defeat in the March local elections.
The latest lawmaker to announce their resignation from the party was İstanbul lawmaker Nimet Özdemir.
She said on X on Wednesday that she is parting ways with the İYİ Party because she no longer feels herself a part of the party where she began her political life. Özdemir said she would continue her political activities in parliament and would do her best for the voters who elected her. The lawmaker did not say whether she would join another party or become an independent deputy.
Kamuoyuna;
Siyasi hayatımın başlangıç noktası ve inandığım değerler uğruna büyük mücadele verdiğim İYİ Parti’den, gönül bağımı kopardığım için ayrılmış bulunmaktayım.
Bir Vekil olarak, sadece beni seçenlerin, seçim bölgemdeki vatandaşlarımızın değil, bütün Türkiye’nin Vekili…
— Nimet Özdemir (@nimetozdemir34) July 24, 2024
Justy two days before Özdemir, Ersagun Yücel, İYİ Party co-founder and İstanbul lawmaker, also announced his resignation from the İYİ Party.
The İYİ Party won 44 seats in parliament in the general election in May. The party expelled one lawmaker last December, and 11 lawmakers have resigned from the party so far.
There are also former lawmakers and local politicians who are parting ways with the party. For instance, former İYİ Party lawmaker Aylin Cesur, also left the party this week.
İYİ had previously broken away from the far-right Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), an election ally of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP). The İYİ Party’s former leader, Meral Akşener, who was a member of the MHP for years, exited it due to disagreements and established her own party in October 2017.
The party set up an alliance with the CHP before the parliamentary and presidential elections in 2018, which also continued for the 2023 elections. The party, which received 9.9 percent of the nationwide vote and 44 seats in parliament in the general election, left the alliance after the opposition bloc candidate, former CHP leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, was defeated by Erdoğan in the presidential election.
Akşener refused to ally with the CHP for this year’s March 31 local elections. Her party instead nominated its own candidates in all provinces and sustained a defeat, winning only 3.7 percent of the nationwide vote, comprising only one provincial municipality along with 23 district and seven town municipalities.
The repercussions of the party’s move to run independently were significant, with a succession of resignations and dismissals among lawmakers and prominent figures within the party and growing calls for Akşener’s resignation.
She was replaced in April by Müsavat Dervişoğlu, the party’s deputy group chairman and a controversial figure with alleged ties to a former intelligence chief known to have resorted to torture during interrogations.