Fresh Arrests Deepen Pressure on Türkiye’s Main Opposition
ISTANBUL-Turkish authorities on Saturday arrested dozens of people in Ankara’s opposition-run Cankaya district as part of an expanding investigation into alleged corruption, intensifying pressure on the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) amid an escalating political confrontation with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government.
According to Turkish media reports, police detained 27 people during early morning raids after prosecutors issued arrest warrants for 36 suspects. The warrants reportedly included allegations of forming or belonging to a criminal organization, bribery and bid-rigging in public tenders.
Among those named in the warrants was Cankaya Mayor Huseyin Can Guner, a member of the CHP, although authorities did not immediately provide further details on his status.
The latest operation comes as the CHP grapples with a leadership crisis after an Ankara court annulled the party’s 2023 leadership election, citing allegations of vote-buying, and removed elected chairman Ozgur Ozel from office. The ruling restored former party leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu, who had lost the internal contest, to the leadership position.
The court’s decision has drawn strong criticism from the opposition, which argues the move is politically motivated and forms part of a broader effort by President Erdogan’s administration to weaken its principal electoral rival. The developments have also intensified debate over the state of democracy and the rule of law in Türkiye.
Following Saturday’s arrests, Ozel, who was visiting the southern city of Adana, urged CHP supporters and party officials to gather outside Cankaya municipal headquarters in a show of solidarity.
The arrests are the latest in a widening crackdown that has seen hundreds of CHP officials investigated or detained on corruption-related allegations. Among those arrested in recent months is Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu, widely regarded by political observers as one of the opposition figures with the strongest potential to challenge Erdogan in a national election.
Pressure on the CHP has increased since its decisive victory in Türkiye’s 2024 local elections, when the party secured significant gains over Erdogan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP). By late June, at least 26 CHP mayors had been jailed or detained while facing investigations into a range of alleged corruption offenses.
The local election success came less than six months after Ozel assumed the party leadership, strengthening the CHP’s political position nationally.
After Imamoglu’s detention, Ozel helped organize the country’s largest anti-government street protests in more than a decade, demonstrations that coincided with a rise in the CHP’s standing in public opinion polls.
Ozel has appealed the Ankara court’s decision removing him as party leader. In an interview released on Friday, he said that if legal avenues failed to reverse the ruling, he would consider establishing a new political party, describing the move as a “worst-case scenario.”
The Turkish government maintains that judicial investigations are conducted independently and has rejected opposition accusations that the legal proceedings are politically motivated.
