Turkish Cypriot opposition political party CTP leader Tufan Erhurman on Friday said he will step down as the party’s leader after the Turkish Cypriot leadership elections which are set to take place next year.
He explained that the party’s internal rules do not allow for an individual to lead it for more than nine consecutive years, and that he has no intention of changing those rules to allow himself to serve for longer.
“Regardless of whether I run in the presidential elections or not, no one can possibly think that I would change the rules just to carry on as party leader,” he said.
He added, “Tufan Erhurman will not be party leader when the term limit specified in the party’s rule expires.
Asked whether he will run in the Turkish Cypriot leadership elections next year, he said that discussing the matter in the current environment is a “luxury”.
Erhurman was first elected as party leader in November 2016, taking over from former Turkish Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat, who had rushed in to serve a brief second term as party leader after the rapid resignation of Ozkan Yorganicoglu following the 2015 Turkish Cypriot leadership elections.
His first electoral test, the ‘parliamentary’ elections of 2018, was a failure, with the party winning only 12 of 50 seats and 21 per cent of the vote – its worst performance since 1998.
However, he was able to piece together a four-party coalition ‘government’ with himself as ‘prime minister’, which held together between February 2018 and May 2019.
He then ran as the CTP’s candidate in the 2020 Turkish Cypriot leadership elections, finishing third with 22 per cent of the vote, before endorsing then incumbent Mustafa Akinci in the second round.
Electoral performance then ticked up, with the CTP winning 18 seats in ‘parliament’ and 32 per cent of the vote in the ‘parliamentary’ elections which took place in January 2022, before a stellar night for the party in that December’s local elections.
The CTP won seven of the north’s 18 mayoralties, more than any other party, taking high profile scalps Kyrenia and Famagusta off the ruling coalition’s candidates.
This performance was backed up by a win in the 2023 ‘parliamentary’ by-election, with the party winning its 19th seat, and winning a north-wide electoral contest for the first time in a decade.
It is not yet clear whether Erhurman will run in next year’s Turkish Cypriot leadership elections. Turkish Cypriot Nicosia mayor Mehmet Harmanci looks likely to run, and Erhurman may be wary of splitting the left wing vote.
Were he not to run, it would be the first time the CTP had not put forward a candidate for a Turkish Cypriot leadership election since 1990.
