Ekrem Imamoglu, the jailed challenger to Turkey’s leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan, was on March 23 selected as the main opposition party’s presidential candidate after a primary election that drew nearly 15mn people to polling stations, the Republican People’s Party (CHP) announced during the late evening.

The CHP only has around 1.6mn members, but in a move that enabled all Turks to register a protest vote against the Erdogan regime’s prosecution of Imamoglu and endorse him as a politician who would make a worthy successor to the president of 22 years, the party opened the voting to non-party members.

As things stand, the vote may prove to have only symbolic value. Imamoglu potentially faces two disqualifying barriers to running for the presidency, namely a possible conviction resulting from the corruption and other charges and the removal of his university degree by authorities who cited irregularities, meaning he no longer has the higher education status required by the constitution to become president. However, citing the scale of the non-party member vote, the CHP argued that an early election was now inevitable. According to the electoral calendar, a presidential poll does not have to take place until 2028.

Imamoglu, who has said his prosecution is entirely politically motivated, shared a message from prison through his lawyers, stating that he was "very happy" about the "record turnout" in the primary vote.

"I would like to share with you some news from Silivri Prison that makes me very happy," a post from his account on X read. 

Tens of millions of Turks "who are suffering from the oppression of the government, the ruined economy, incompetence and lawlessness" voted in the ballot, it added.

Imamoglu was the sole candidate in the poll.

CHP leader Ozgur Ozel said around 1.6mn of the votes came from party members, while the rest were cast in solidarity by non-party members.

The party set up two types of ballot boxes – official ones for members and additional ones for non-members.