Dhe verdict was announced when Istanbul’s mayor, Ekrem Imamoglu, who had been found guilty, called his supporters to a rally in front of Istanbul’s city hall via Twitter. It is important to “show our will”. On Wednesday afternoon, the judge sentenced the popular mayor of the opposition CHP to two years and seven months in prison for allegedly insulting a civil servant, thereby banning him from politics. In order for the judgment to become final, the Court of Cassation still has to approve it.
It was already dark when Imamoglu exclaimed in the evening at the place where he twice celebrated his victory over the AKP candidate in 2019: “This is proof that there is no longer any justice in Turkey.” Every decision that the judges and prosecutors meet is for their own benefit. He sharply attacked the circle of people around President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. He described them as “politicians who say they are the state and they are the nation, they say they own everything”. They influenced the judiciary and they would have ordered this verdict as well.
There spoke someone who is ready to challenge Erdoğan in the presidential election, which must take place at the same time as the parliamentary elections in six months at the latest. The security precautions in and around the Higher Regional Court in Istanbul’s Kartal district were correspondingly large. There has been a change in the judiciary in the past few months. Because the judge who initially presided over the Imamoglu case said in early summer that what Imamoglu was accused of in no way justified a political ban. After that he was transferred to Samsun as a punitive measure.
Opponents of Erdoğan believe the verdict is politically motivated
At Imamoglu’s side, Meral Aksener, the leader of the Iyi party, the second largest of the six parties that have formed an opposition alliance against Erdoğan, took the floor on Wednesday evening. She recalled that in 1998, in a trial that was also politically motivated, Erdoğan had been sentenced to prison and banned from engaging in political activities. At the point where Imamoglu and Aksener are now standing, he exclaimed: “The song doesn’t end here.” It didn’t end. The political ban against Erdoğan was lifted, and in 2002 Erdoğan’s inexorable rise continued. Aksener therefore predicted: “This song will not end here either.”
The broadcaster HALK TV, which is close to the CHP, commented that the opposition’s sails had been filled again since Wednesday. Because everyone must now understand that the “order of the palace” is behind the verdict, but not the law. It was somewhat tragic for CHP chairman Kemal Kilicdaroglu, who is also said to have ambitions to run for president, that he was in Berlin. He was connected to the rally via video. The verdict shows that the court is “under the influence and conspiracy of the president,” he said.
While Erdoğan is wooing the leader of the Iyi party, Aksener, in order to possibly free her from the opposition alliance in time for the elections and he therefore spares her from attacks, Kilicdaroglu is being prosecuted for “insulting the president”. Judgments have not yet been made. But this is the case with Istanbul’s former CHP leader, Canan Kaftancioglu.
