Within opposition circles, every eye is fixed on the “Congress-annulment lawsuit” scheduled for 30 June. The prospect that the results of the CHP’s 38th Ordinary Congress—where the party leadership changed hands—might be overturned by a ruling of absolute nullity is causing the political pundits who dwell on social media to lose sleep.
Yet for this crowd, the true nightmare is not that possibility itself but the stance former chairman Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu might take if absolute nullity is declared. From Kılıçdaroğlu’s words: “I can’t issue such a statement. I hope an absolute-nullity ruling won’t emerge, but if it does, I can’t leave my party to a court-appointed trustee. If I refuse, a trustee will be sent in. Should I just hand it over to a trustee?”, it is clear he is itching to retake the party chair, even if it means getting there by appointment, by drawing lots, by reading omens, or even by flipping a coin or rolling dice.
So, after the debacle of the 2023 elections (and the policies he pursued afterward that further eroded his standing among the main-opposition electorate), Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu has seen his public support plummet. On what, or on whom, is he relying? Put differently: on the final voyage steered under his own captaincy, the ship capsized, whereas on the first voyage in which he was not even on deck the CHP secured victory on storm-tossed seas. What, then, is the raison d’être of Kılıçdaroğlu’s audacity? The answer is straightforward: Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu is banking on four elements—negative partisanship, the opposition media, CHP opinion leaders, and the CHP parliamentary group.
Negative Partisanship
Michael Maggiotto and James E. Piereson’s 1977 “hostility hypothesis” posits that animosity toward a rival party reduces the likelihood of straying from one’s own partisan identity. Building on that premise, the negative-partisanship literature likewise holds that voters support a party or candidate less out of positive feelings or party attachment than out of antipathy—even hatred—toward the other side. In Turkey, the political stance corresponding to negative partisanship is anti-Erdoğanism. Indeed, anti-Erdoğanism is not merely a political posture; it is a phenomenon imbued with a powerful emotional identity. So much so that, regardless of party, the vast majority of opposition voters choose alignment not with a party but against Erdoğan himself. One of Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu’s chief assurances is precisely that anti-Erdoğanist glue—a sameness procedure that binds those voters around a supra-partisan purpose.
Kılıçdaroğlu—just as in the 2023 elections—hopes that this “sameness procedure,” which renders party loyalties meaningless and turns all opposition voters into a single bloc, will once again do its job when the moment arrives. Nor is his optimism entirely misplaced. Lest human memory be condemned to forgetfulness, let us recall the 2023 campaign. Weren’t the doubts and criticisms about his possible candidacy cut off as sharply as with a knife once that candidacy was confirmed? Were those who cried, “Stop, crowds—this road is a dead end,” not branded as troublemakers? Was Meral Akşener and her İYİ Party, who declared that the opposition had not one but two alternatives better than Kılıçdaroğlu, not accused of sowing discord? Was one of those alternatives tarred as an “ANAP leftover” and the other as a “fascist”? Was Muharrem İnce—exercising one of the most fundamental political rights, the right to stand for election—not pelted with stones? Did a clique, parched for office and status after years away from the spoils of power, not market a figure long past his prime as a gallant knight? Was criticizing Kılıçdaroğlu’s campaign not treated almost as an act of heresy? When passions flared, did reason not flee? All of this happened—and in abundance. Nothing guarantees that such an atmosphere will not return in the next elections. What is more, because those contests were fought under the formula of a “weak opposition but a strong main opposition,” the institutional capacity of parties outside the CHP was gutted, and non-CHP opposition voters saw their sense of attachment to their own parties eroded. It is precisely this landscape that inspires Kılıçdaroğlu as he crafts a strategy for a possible comeback. Indeed, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu is the politician who has harvested the richest crop from the field of anti-Erdoğanism. So much so that, despite his dismal record against Erdoğan, despite the presence of more capable alternatives, despite the resistance of his largest partner to his candidacy, despite his weakness in reputable polls, and despite his failure to secure the social legitimacy a candidacy requires, he still managed to become the opposition’s presidential nominee. He pulled this off by exploiting the opposition electorate’s hostility to Erdoğan. Kılıçdaroğlu has deployed voters’ negative partisanship—their absolute anti-Erdoğanism—as a rationalizing element, an ideological element, and an emotional-moral element all at once.
Negative partisanship has, first and foremost, served to rationalize Kılıçdaroğlu’s past electoral defeats. Once his candidacy was declared, the reactions and criticisms leveled against him subsided, and in time the opposition arrived at a consensus that he was, in fact, a fitting candidate. Second, by playing an ideological role, negative partisanship elevated anti-Erdoğanism into an overarching political identity, thereby blurring the ideological differences among opposition parties. This drew around Mr Kemal parties and elites that, at first glance, seemed ideologically incompatible with him. Finally, in its emotional-moral dimension, negative partisanship turned supporting Kılıçdaroğlu into a moral duty in the eyes of opposition voters. Thus Kılıçdaroğlu was able to collect all the bonuses that negative partisanship showers from the top down. The scenario in his mind today is the same: once he reassumes—or rather, is appointed to—the party leadership, the initial backlash will soon subside, the CHP rank and file will forget their disappointment, and, energized by negative partisanship—in other words, anti-Erdoğanism—they will once again rally to him.
Opposition Media
Kılıçdaroğlu’s second great source of confidence is the institutional opposition media. After Doğan Media withdrew from the press ecosystem, Turkey was left without outlets that aim to keep their readers, viewers—in short, their customers—satisfied; in their place a media order has taken root that focuses on pleasing whichever political institution or politician it lives off. Although the mechanism the main opposition commands is not an exact copy of the one built by the government, it is structurally similar. The CHP’s success—especially in local elections—has given the party a measure of privilege in controlling public resources, and the most significant result has been the emergence of this opposition-media system.
Taking the post-2023 revelation of the CHP–Halk TV nexus as our point of departure, we can say this: should Kılıçdaroğlu reclaim the CHP chair and succeed—above all against Ekrem İmamoğlu and Özgür Özel—in shrinking the spheres of influence of his internal rivals, the institutional opposition media will ultimately have no option but to fall in line behind him. Once drawn back into Kılıçdaroğlu’s orbit, that media will almost certainly devote the bulk of its energy to shoring up his battered leadership image. Here we must also recall the media’s power to stoke negative partisanship. Having forfeited its financial independence and forced to rely on the main-opposition party’s patronage simply to keep the lights on, the opposition media has long provided a fertile seedbed for anti-Erdoğanism. The political impulses and emotions of a polarized opposition electorate are both gratified and molded through such outlets; indeed, the very moral framework for how an opposition voter “ought” to position themselves on any given event is laid down by the opposition media itself. During the 2023 campaign, for instance, that media branded Muharrem İnce “the Palace’s man” and Meral Akşener “a deep-state agent,” turning their political stances into matters of moral judgment and manipulating mass perception for no other reason than their refusal to hew to Kılıçdaroğlu’s line. In an age when propaganda eclipses truth—and in a country like Turkey, where heroism and treachery teeter on the fine wire between a moment’s applause and a moment’s jeering—it is plain that a dependent opposition media will remain one of Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu’s most potent instruments for steering the masses. In this connection, it is worth adding, as a side note, that an independent broadcaster such as Fatih Altaylı—widely watched by opposition audiences and among the fiercest critics of Kılıçdaroğlu—finds himself, metaphorically speaking, kept under lock and key.
CHP Opinion Leaders and the CHP Parliamentary Group
Politics, as everyone knows, is a stage where those who break their vows the moment the fodder runs out, those who attain sudden enlightenment the day they lose office, and those who become paragons of morality the instant their barley ration is cut prance about at will. One of the people who understands Turkey’s political talent pool most intimately is, without doubt, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, who spent thirteen years at the helm of the main opposition. Over that span he rubbed shoulders with many a figure, and he surely carries in his mind a template for the typical political operator’s temperament. According to that template, the CHP-adjacent opinion leaders who yesterday elevated him to the rank of a Thirteenth Imam and today treat him like a modern-day Yazid can be expected—true to their usual routines—to bow once more before power. Those who refuse may still fall silent for fear of excommunication by the neighborhood. Assuming he can reclaim the CHP seal, Kılıçdaroğlu likely counts on these same figures snapping to attention again and on being able to shape the opposition public to his own liking.
The CHP candidate slate for the 2023 elections was drawn up while Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu was still party chairman. As regards the trustee question, the sitting CHP deputies fall into three camps: those who stand with Özgür Özel’s leadership, those who remain loyal to Kılıçdaroğlu, and those adopting a wait-and-see approach. By far the largest of the three are the wait-and-seers. Given that many political elites are driven by the refined concerns of protecting their seat, securing the next term, and claiming the lion’s share of the party’s spoils, perks, and status, the prevalence of that wait-and-see stance is hardly surprising. Still, if Kılıçdaroğlu should regain the helm, some of those now backing Özel may well revisit their position as the new leadership’s influence ebbs and Kılıçdaroğlu’s clout grows. The CHP caucus in the Grand National Assembly therefore stands as one of Kılıçdaroğlu’s chief pillars of support.
Looking at the current tableau, it is no exaggeration to say that Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu’s moves are more deliberate and calculated than Nasreddin Hodja’s famous attempt to ferment yogurt in a lake on the off-chance that it might “just work.” Can Kılıçdaroğlu succeed despite the opposition electorate’s still-unresolved 2023 trauma and the host of impasses that lie before him? For an essay that opens those questions to debate, the wisest course may be to await the ruling of 30 June…
