Fifty thousand people on a Sunday afternoon. Why? To make sure their voices couldn’t be ignored.
Ankara’s Tandogan Square turned into a sea of red flags and Atatürk T-shirts as Turkiye’s main opposition CHP staged its biggest rally in years.
On Monday, a court will decide whether to throw out the party’s 2023 leadership election.
A ruling could topple CHP leader Özgür Özel and rattle Turkish politics.
“Did you ever see Tandogan Square like this, Erdogan?” Özel asked from the stage, as chants of “Erdogan resign!” echoed back.
He framed the hearing as a “judicial coup” against the party that beat President Erdogan’s AKP in last year’s local elections.
Opposition Vows To Resist In Turkey
“They know they can’t win where there’s democracy. They know they can’t hide where there’s justice,” he said.
The stakes? Huge. The CHP calls the accusations of vote-rigging “slander” and warns the case is part of a broader crackdown.
Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu, Erdogan’s most high-profile rival, sent a letter from prison.
He accused the government of trying to predetermine the next election.
“The era of ‘I’ will end.”The era of ‘we’ will begin.”
With markets watching and protesters promising to “resist, resist, resist,” Monday’s court decision could mark a turning point.
Or light an even bigger fire under Turkiye’s opposition.
