 voters want current chairman Özgür Özel to remain at the helm of the party, while supporters of Turkey’s ruling alliance favor a return of former leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, according to a recent opinion poll.){kind=link}
A majority of main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) voters want current chairman Özgür Özel to remain at the helm of the party, while supporters of Turkey’s ruling alliance favor a return of former leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, according to a recent opinion poll.
The results of Metropoll’s “Turkey’s Pulse” survey for June were announced on Monday on X by Professor Özer Sencar, the owner of the company.
Özellikle iktidar ve CHP seçmeninin tavrına dikkat ediniz. pic.twitter.com/dvT34RlmDO
— Ozer Sencar (@ozersencar1) June 30, 2025
The participants of the survey, conducted on 1,251 people across 28 provinces in Turkey June 16-19, were asked, “Would you prefer Özgür Özel or Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu to be the chairman of the CHP?”
A total of 79.4 percent of CHP voters said they wanted Özel to remain party leader, while only 8.1 percent backed Kılıçdaroğlu for the role. Among the general public, Özel led Kılıçdaroğlu 44 percent to 25.8 percent, with 30.2 percent of respondents either offering no opinion or declining to answer.
However, the picture looked very different among voters from President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s ruling alliance. Among those who backed the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) in the 2023 general election, 40.3 percent said they would prefer Kılıçdaroğlu as CHP chairman, while just 18.3 percent favored Özel. Support for Kılıçdaroğlu was even higher among voters from the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), with 51.6 percent backing him compared to 22.6 percent for Özel.
The survey results come amid an ongoing legal dispute that could annul the results of the CHP’s 38th Ordinary Congress, held in November 2023, which saw Özel unseat longtime leader Kılıçdaroğlu in a rare internal contest. At the most recent hearing, held on June 24, an Ankara court postponed a decision until September 8, citing procedural questions.
The court case in question stems from an appeal filed by former CHP member Tolgahan Erdoğan, who alleges irregularities in delegate selection and vote counting at the party’s 38th congress. Kılıçdaroğlu is listed in the indictment as the “aggrieved party,” and critics say he is now using the case to challenge the leadership that replaced him.
If the court annuls the congress, Kılıçdaroğlu would be considered the party’s de jure chairman again because Özel’s election would be declared null and void.
Kılıçdaroğlu, who led the CHP from 2010 to 2023, was widely criticized after his loss to Erdoğan in the 2023 presidential election. While initially stepping aside without contest, he has since accused the current leadership of orchestrating a campaign to discredit him and vowed to defend the party from internal and external threats.
The dispute has sparked a power struggle within the CHP. Özel and his allies, including jailed İstanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, have warned that a judicial reversal of the congress outcome would amount to an undemocratic coup against the party’s internal democracy. They insist that leadership changes must go through party delegates, not courtrooms.
The ongoing power struggle has reopened longstanding divisions within the CHP and raised concerns among observers that the opposition may fracture at a time when its political momentum is at a high point following victories in the March 2024 local elections.