Sila Usar Incirli on Tuesday night became the first person to formally announce her candidacy to lead the north’s largest opposition political party, the centre-left CTP.
She made the announcement at a party meeting in Nicosia.
Incirli, 52, entered frontline politics in 2018, being elected during the ‘parliamentary’ elections which were held in January that year. She was then selected as the CTP’s candidate for the 2022 Turkish Cypriot Nicosia mayoral election, but that election was won by a landslide by fellow centre-left party the TDP’s Mehmet Harmanci.
She is the daughter of Naci Talat Usar, one of the most influential figures from the CTP’s early years.
It is likely that Incirli will be joined in the race to lead the CTP by two other candidates, with the party’s secretary-general Erkut Sahali and his predecessor Asim Akansoy both having expressed their interest in the role.
Sahali told news website Kibris Turk Haber last Friday that “I have assumed responsibility in this party for years, and now I am ready to take on even greater responsibility”, signalling his intention to run for the party’s leadership.
He is also 52 years old and was first elected to ‘parliament’ in 2013, and has served as the north’s ‘agriculture minister’ on two separate occasions, under ‘prime ministers’ Omer Kalyoncu and Tufan Erhurman, who is now the Turkish Cypriot leader, while also briefly serving as ‘environment minister’ under Kalyoncu.
Akansoy, meanwhile, told Yeni Bakis Web TV last Wednesday that “I do not shirk my duties, I am ready to take on any responsibility”, and that “there is a great pressure on me to run for party chairman to serve this country and this party”.
He is 58 years old and entered politics as former Turkish Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat’s private secretary in 2005, before being elected as the CTP’s secretary-general for the first time in 2011, and serving in post until 2013.
He then entered ‘parliament’ in 2013, and served as ‘interior minister’ under Omer Kalyoncu, before becoming the CTP’s secretary-general for the second time in 2022.
He remained in that role until April this year, when he was beaten in an internal party election by Sahali.
The CTP has been without a leader since last Thursday, when Tufan Erhurman resigned ahead of becoming Turkish Cypriot leader on Friday. Turkish Cypriot leaders are required to relinquish party political ties upon entering office.
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