Republican People's Party (CHP) leader Özgür Özel's rallies after the arrest of Ekrem İmamoğlu, the mayor of Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality (IBB), drew reactions from within the party.
On Sunday, the CHP held the 84th of its rallies under the name “The Nation Claims Its Will” in Yalova.
Ekrem İmamoğlu's advisor İbrahim Özkan said that the rallies drained the CHP's energy.
“Take off your blinders”
“CHP organizations should stop looking at the world through blinders,” Özkan said, arguing that party organizations act from a narrow perspective.
Stating that the impact of social media is exaggerated, Özkan said that politics should reach the remotest corners of Anatolia:
They will go to the remotest corners and ask how the people are doing. This is how politics is done. The people you don't touch are not yours. You cannot go out and motivate people with ‘Yiğitim Aslanım romanticism’. The ones who went can't go anymore, it's cold. You can't have meetings all the time.
Ibrahim Özkan, IYI Party's Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality (IBB) Deputy Group Deputy Chairman, had resigned from the IYI Party for advocating the cooperation of the CHP and the IYI Party in the local elections.