“In every heart hides a lion.” This is a common folk saying. And in every CHP member’s heart and mind lies the thought: “One day I could be chair of the party.” A sort of “Why not?” sentiment. Let’s put aside the phrase “every CHP member” as it might be an exaggeration—but still, 90% of them live with this mindset, something unseen in any other party. No matter their place inside the party—ordinary member or deputy chair—it makes no difference. What fuels this thought is not what has happened so far, but the fact that names keep surfacing for the chairmanship. The reasoning is: “If he can do it, why can’t I?”
But can they, really? No. They cannot. Because Özgür Özel is only the eighth chair of the 102-year old party. That fact alone is the most concrete proof that not every CHP member can be chairman. But will CHP members ever give up on the dream that they might become chairman one day? The answer is also no.
WHEN DID THE IDEA OF BECOMING CHAIRMAN FIRST CROSS ÖZGÜR ÖZEL’S MIND?
We cannot know exactly when the thought—”I must become chair”—first came to Özgür Özel. But there are things we do know.
About ten years ago, Özel set his sights on the party leadership and moved into action. At his side were the same people who still stand by him today. Such a move, a classic of CHP politics, was normal and expected. At that time, the name Ekrem İmamoğlu was not yet on the political scene. The government was preoccupied with confronting the Kurdish political movement.
The CHP, by contrast, had a relatively comfortable space, and there was room for internal struggles. Within the CHP, there was no one who did not know Özel had ambitions for the chairmanship. Did Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu know? Of course he did—it was blindingly obvious. After all, the saying “even the deaf sultan has heard it” applies above all to the CHP. This should not be taken as transparency: the truth is, there are no secrets in the CHP. By the time you descend in the elevator from the upper floors of party headquarters, whatever was discussed upstairs has already spread to everyone in the party. Long before.
Then, in 2017, Kılıçdaroğlu launched his “March for Justice” from Ankara to Istanbul. Özel shelved his ambition for the chairmanship. But whether he erased it from his mind and his heart—that remains unknown.
THE LUCK AND MISFORTUNE OF MANISA
Özel is from Manisa. It is worth dwelling on Manisa for a moment. Manisa is a city that lives in the shadow of İzmir. It is just half an hour by car between the two—forty minutes, at most. So close, and yet İzmir is both a blessing and a curse for Manisa.
Manisa is known as the “City of Princes,” a legacy from the Ottoman era when imperial princes governed the province. Yet İzmir, Turkey’s third biggest city, offers Manisa neither attention nor opportunity —socially or politically.
If you were a young person from Manisa during a period when the CHP was powerful, you could never get political access to İzmir. For careers, Manisa’s children had no choice but to study—often away at boarding schools. In politics, they could only move forward by finding ways around İzmir’s shadow.
A comparison with Central Anatolia helps explain. Consider the provinces that live in the shadow of Ankara, the capital: Kırıkkale, Yozgat, Tokat, Çankırı, Çorum. Forgotten provinces. Their inhabitants, feeling neglected, became fertile ground for right-wing politics.
While the children of Manisa studied under İzmir’s shadow in the hope of finding jobs, the children of provinces under Ankara’s shadow studied with the goal of making their way into the capital. Notably, despite their small populations, Yozgat and Çankırı have produced a remarkable number of policemen, officers, police chiefs, and governors.
A POLITICIAN’S TEST WITH THE MICROPHONE
Özgür Özel has been the chair for only two years. But already he is defined by his attitude to the microphone. He seems to enjoy a life lived through the microphone. Of course, politics is about organizing and speaking—but not as if narrating a football match. Politics is not broadcasting.
One cannot help but think that even in friendly gatherings, Özel is constantly in the role of narrator. His predecessor, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, was more of a “listener,” while Özel seems more of a “teller.”
Nor can we say that “the spirit of Deniz Baykal has taken him over.” For Baykal, yes, was a good speaker—but as a politician who had breathed the dust of Ankara’s Mülkiye, his speeches always had a theoretical framework, whether right or wrong. Bülent Ecevit’s most famous speeches, meanwhile, were in the 1970s, when they carried him to leadership and when the left reached its widest mass appeal. Yet Ecevit’s speeches—though he himself insisted in vain on being included among “great poets”—were unmistakably poetic. And it was thanks to this language that he succeeded in making himself understood by the people.
(PS: Mülkiye is the name of Ankara University’s Political Science Faculty)
THE QUESTION OF NICKNAMES
In the CHP, the nickname given to the chair—and embraced by the public—matters greatly. Atatürk is remembered as “Gazi” (the Veteran). İsmet İnönü is called “Paşa” (the Pasha). Ecevit is, without dispute, “Karaoğlan” (the dark-haired lad). At one point, Baykal was called “Yağız Oğlan,” (the swarthy lad) in reference to Karaoğlan, but it never caught on. Because of his protruding, flushed cheeks, the nickname “Domates” (Tomato) suited him better. Here, let us also respectfully remember the late Ayşen Gruda, a unique figure in our theater and cinema, who years ago was crowned “Miss Tomato” in a television contest.
As for Kılıçdaroğlu, despite Erdoğan’s insistence on calling him “Mr. Kemal,” within the party base—and more broadly, with a nod also to his Alevi identity—he came to be called “Piro,” meaning “founder, leader.”
Now, the nickname to be given to Özel is of great importance. Meanwhile, Ekrem İmamoğlu is already referred to by young people as “Eko.” But will “Eko” suffice for İmamoğlu? Between the two, who will first earn a new nickname? Nicknames are no small matter.
