Former AKP members to form new political party

Nora Bendary

Prominent politicians and former ministers in Turkey who served under President Recep Tayyip Erdogan are banding together to form a new political party alongside ex-President Abdullah Gül.

Sources close to the former Deputy Prime Minister of Turkey responsible for the Economy, Ali Babacan, confirmed that the party’s launch will come later this month and will be co-founded by Gül.

Widely-known Turkish journalist and columnist Fehmi Koru, who is known for sharing close ties with both Babacan and Gül, said that the party will also include former interior minister Beşir Atalay, former minister of finance Mehmet Şimşek and former President of the Constitutional Court Haşim Kılıç.

Koru, who is known for extensively covering the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) news, noted that Babacan has held negotiations and interviews with over 100 AKP personalities to know their opinion about forming the fresh party.

Backing the motion for new ideas that support the expectations of future generations, Babacan had quit his AKP membership last July.

“Turkey needs new thinking, and the younger generations are looking for a different future that reflects their ambitions,” he said.

Babacan’s AKP exit was undertaken by other officials who are expected to now join the new party.

Following failures in March’s local elections, Erdogan’s ruling (AKP) has seen widespread resignations.

In July alone, 89 members of the party’s secretariat resigned in the southern city of Gaziantep as the party’s performance slumped and lost important municipalities in the region. Several reports said they planned to join Babacan’s party.

Statistics show that the AKP lost around one million of its members nationwide. Most have abandoned the party in protest to its poor performance and Erdogan’s one-man rule.

Angered by the exodus, Erdogan accused AKP deserters of treason and threatened some top officials who renounced the party with losing their posts.

Turkish affairs expert Mohamed Abdelkader told The Reference in an interview that this new party sees that Erdogan’s policies might drift Turkey towards the abyss, because the country is on the verge of a serious political and economic crisis, especially after the president lost the support of the people and his party, which is facing internal splits.

He further added that this new party adopts a more moderate ideology far from the ideology adopted by Erdogan’s party, pointing out that the Turkish President no longer views the party as an institutional party with leadership, but became seen as a personal party controlled by the president, not to mention seeing his political opponents as people driven by the conspiracy.