OPINION - On Turkish court's nullification of CHP congress

• Ensar Kivrak is a researcher at the Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research (SETA), a Turkish think tank.

A landmark ruling by a Turkish appellate court has reignited a debate that democratic systems periodically confront: under what circumstances a judiciary may legitimately invalidate the internal decisions of political parties. The answer, in this case, may be less ambiguous than the political noise surrounding it suggests.

In March 2025, the 36th Civil Chamber of the Ankara Regional Court of Appeal declared the opposition Republican People's Party's (CHP) 38th ordinary congress, held on Nov. 4–5, 2023, absolutely null and void. The ruling also struck down the Istanbul Provincial Congress of Oct. 8, 2023, which had served as a foundational step for the national gathering. The verdict effectively rendered CHP leader Ozgur Ozel's election and all subsequent party decisions legally non-existent from the outset.

The immediate political reaction split along predictable lines. Supporters of Ozel's leadership framed the ruling as unacceptable judicial interference in opposition politics. Critics of the congress process, by contrast, argued the court had done no more than its institutional duty. Cutting through the partisanship, however, requires a closer look at what the court actually found and why those findings carry substantial legal weight.

What the court actually found

At the center of the ruling is a finding of organized vitiation of consent: the court determined that the delegates’ will at the November 2023 congress was systematically corrupted through financial inducements. According to the ruling, based on evidence and testimony drawn from parallel civil and criminal proceedings, delegates and their relatives received foreign currency, cash payments, high-value consumer electronics, and real estate commitments in exchange for their votes. Beyond direct cash transfers, institutional resources of the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality—then under CHP control—were allegedly channeled toward delegates in the form of job placements and employment promises.

Under Turkish private law, a legal act is absolutely void—not merely voidable—when it violates mandatory statutory provisions, public order, or general morality. Article 27 of the Turkish Code of Obligations, applicable to party proceedings through the civil code, sets this threshold. The court found the congress had not merely bent procedural rules but crossed into territory that triggers outright nullity: organized criminal conduct that simultaneously violated the Political Parties Act, Turkish Penal Code, and electoral law. A delegate vote purchased with a suitcase of foreign currency, the court reasoned, does not constitute a democratic expression of will deserving legal protection.

Critics who describe the verdict as unprecedented or aberrant overlook a consistent thread in Turkish judicial history. In 2010, an Ankara court intervened in a Saadet (Felicity) Party congress after finding bylaw violations and temporarily transferred party leadership to a convening committee. In 2016, a separate Ankara court annulled decisions taken at an extraordinary MHP congress on grounds of procedural irregularity and abuse of authority. Both cases established that Turkish courts see internal party compliance with democratic principles as a justiciable—not merely aspirational—standard. What distinguishes the CHP ruling is the gravity of the underlying conduct: where earlier cases turned on technical disputes over signatures or a quorum, the 2025 decision rests on findings of organized bribery.

The constitutional framework backing the ruling is clear. Articles 68 and 69 of the Turkish Constitution, along with Articles 4 and 93 of the Political Parties Act, require that party organs, elections and decisions comply with democratic principles. Legal scholars note that this obligation is not a formal courtesy. It is an enforceable condition of a party's legal personality. A party's charter sits at the base of the hierarchy of norms; it cannot override constitutional mandates or the law's mandatory provisions, regardless of how many delegates ratify its outcomes.

How European courts have handled similar situations

From a comparative perspective, the ruling is consistent with how constitutional courts in several European democracies have handled analogous situations. German, Spanish, and French jurisprudence each recognizes that internal party democracy is a public law obligation, not a private matter, and that judicial review of gross violations serves rather than subverts the democratic order. The European Court of Human Rights has similarly held that restrictions on party autonomy are justifiable where they protect the rights of members and the integrity of democratic processes.

The immediate legal effect of an absolute nullity finding under Turkish law is restoration to the pre-existing legal state. Because a void act is treated as never having occurred, the entire chain of party decisions downstream from the nullified congress is also rendered void. This domino effect explains why the decision is politically explosive: it not only invalidates an election but also brings an end to a party leadership that has been in place for nearly 2 1/2 years.

Whether the Turkish judiciary's intervention will ultimately strengthen or weaken confidence in democratic institutions depends on a question the courts cannot answer alone: whether political actors accept that no party—however prominent or however large its membership—is exempt from the foundational norms that make democratic competition meaningful in the first place. A ballot carries legitimacy only when the process producing it is free from organized corruption. Where that condition fails, courts in functioning democracies are not merely permitted to act; they are obligated to do so.

*Opinions expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Anadolu.