The leader of the opposition Good Party (IP) Meral Akşener has ruled out an alliance with other parties for upcoming municipal elections. However, her lengthy meeting with the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader seems to have convinced her to think about it again. Akşener announced after she met with Özgür Özel on Thursday that her party’s general executive board would discuss cooperation with CHP at Monday’s board meeting.
Akşener was blunt in announcing the end of any alliance with other opposition parties after the Nation’s Alliance IP formed with CHP and other smaller parties lost May’s general elections to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
The outspoken former interior minister, however, notoriously returned to the six-party bloc for the May elections after storming off the alliance in reaction to CHP’s then-leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu’s nomination as presidential candidate. Long before that, in 2018, she had announced her intent to step down as the party chair before declaring her nomination.
The IP leader was angry at Kılıçdaroğlu after the election loss but appears to be warming up to the idea of an alliance with CHP after Özel took the helm at the party last month. However, it remains to be seen whether the realliance will further alienate her supporters. Several top figures in the party already quit when she rejected the alliance for municipal elections. The party is already embattled with intrafighting, with some members accusing the administration of corruption.
The Good Party was formed by dissidents of the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), which is the main ally of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party). Yet, their ambition to establish a new nationalist front fell short of expectations as it only garnered less than 10% of the vote in legislative elections last May, compared to over 25% of CHP, the second party in the elections.
An alliance seems the only tangible way for IP to get candidates elected while CHP similarly relies on alliances to win the local vote in places where it does not particularly have a strong showing. In Istanbul, CHP’s candidate Ekrem Imamoğlu won the 2019 municipal elections thanks to support from other opposition parties that disrupted lengthy AK Party rule in Türkiye’s most populated city.
