An exchange between İstanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu and a woman in the audience during which İmamoğlu refused to label people voting for a pro-Kurdish party as “terrorists” during a popular YouTube show went viral before the show was aired.
The exchange took place during a political debate program to soon be aired on the Gain digital platform before the local elections scheduled for March 31.
The program, “Mevzular: Açık Mikrofon” (Topics: Open Microphone), is moderated by Turkish musician, director, screenwriter and internet celebrity Oğuzhan Uğur. Every episode of the program draws millions of viewers.
In the show’s trailer posted on Uğur’s “BaBaLa TV” YouTube channel, İmamoğlu, who is seeking re-election as the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) candidate, is asked by a woman in the audience if he has any fears about losing the election due to his sympathies for the pro-Kurdish Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party).
The woman, whose name is not mentioned in the video, says the DEM Party failed in the general election and that cooperating with it could be costly for İmamoğlu.
When İmamoğlu ended the years-long Justice and Development Party (AKP) rule in İstanbul by winning the 2019 vote, he had the support of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), the DEM Party’s predecessor. He is again seeking the votes of the Kurds to secure another election victory, although the DEM Party has fielded its own mayoral candidate for this election.
When the woman continued her criticism of the DEM Party due to the party’s alleged links to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey and much of the international community, İmamoğlu asked, “Should we declare the 7 or 8 million people who voted for the DEM Party as traitors?”
When the woman answered in the affirmative, the mayor said that it was right in line with the AKP mentality to act like a judge and label 7 or 8 million as terrorists, receiving huge applause from the audience.
The trailer was widely circulated on social media and watched more than 200,000 times in less than 24 hours on YouTube.
The pro-Kurdish Green Left Party (YSP), another predecessor of the DEM Party, secured 8.8 percent of the vote in the 2023 parliamentary elections, while the HDP won 11.7 percent in 2018.
Although the pro-Kurdish parties enjoy wide public support, mostly from Kurds, they are despised by Turkey’s nationalists, who accuse them of having links to the PKK.
Before the general and presidential elections in May, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan frequently accused the CHP and its then-leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, who was defeated by Erdoğan in a runoff election, of having ties to the PKK, leading the soft-spoken Kılıçdaroğlu to adopt a harsher and more nationalist discourse.
İmamoğlu also slammed Burcu Köksal, a mayoral candidate from his party for western Afyonkarahisar province who said the doors of the municipality will be open to all parties, if she is elected, except for the DEM Party.
İmamoğlu said Köksal should either look for a new job or a new party if she is not going to embrace all people if elected mayor.