President Recep Erdoğan appoints new prime minister

President-elect Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has announced the new chairman and Prime Minister of Turkey as Ahmet Davutoğlu, Turkey’s  former foreign minister on Thursday at AK Party’s Central Executive Board (MYK) meeting.

Potential candidates were outlined last Monday at AK Party’s Central Decision-Making and Administrative Committee (MKYK) where candidates for the AK Party’s next chair were discussed by party deputies in a closed meeting at party headquarters.

On the other hand, President-elect Erdoğan presented criteria for the upcoming prime minister at the farewell reception hosted by outgoing President Gül where he stated that the upcoming prime minister should never take a step backward in combatting the Gülen Movement and will never make concessions to the process. The second criterion determined by Erdoğan was to elect a prime minister who will pursue common sense and consultation, especially during times of crisis.

President Abdullah Gül in his farewell cerimony  on Tuesday has announced that Ahmet Davutoğlu would become the party’s new leader and Turkey’s new prime minister.

Last week, Davutoğlu’s advisor Ali Sarıkaya was appointed as the Chief Advisor to the Prime Minister of Turkey, leading many to assume that Davutoğlu would become the next Prime Minister.

Davutoğlu has been the Minister of Foreign Affairs since 2009 and has previously served as the chief advisor to the PM. As a minister, he has promoted Turkey to become a regional power in the Middle East and Europe and has encouraged Turkey to play a more prominent role in global politics.

 

Source: dailysabah