Winning the upcoming March local elections will open the way for victory in the 2028 general elections, Republican People’s Party (CHP) Chairperson Özgür Özel said Tuesday.

Özel was speaking in his hometown, Manisa province, on his first visit after Türkiye’s main opposition party dumped its embattled leader in favor of an untested former pharmacist in the early hours of Sunday, five months following a devastating election defeat to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his ruling political alliance.

The CHP voted for Özel at the party’s hourslong 38th congress in Ankara, ending a 13-year term for Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu after squandering what many viewed as the opposition’s best chance to end Erdoğan’s two-decade rule.

"The doors of the party are open. Let’s make new members; let’s win the hearts of non-members. Suppose we win great success together in the upcoming local elections. In that case, this government will no longer be able to keep these people with this poverty, this high cost of living, this inflation and this unemployment. Local elections will be the key to the next general elections. We will all work together, we will succeed together, we will change the government," he said.

Özel also indicated that those who left the CHP can return.

Özel will be officially sworn in as the CHP’s eighth chairperson on Wednesday in a handover ceremony, taking over the post from Kılıçdaroğlu, who had held the post since 2010.

Many view it as a new period in the history of the CHP. Özel’s first challenge will be to win victories in the local elections. The first Caucus will be held on Saturday, where Özel will discuss with members choosing the central decision and executive board (MYK). He will have the first meeting with the MYK on Tuesday while holding the first parliamentary group meeting the next day.

On Thursday, Özel is expected to visit southern Hatay in the earthquake zone, followed by Osmaniye province.

Özel also promised to come together with the party organization more often and make decisions together. Within this scope, Özel is expected to meet with the congress delegates every six months. The first meeting with the party’s provincial heads, on the other hand, will take place on Nov. 18-19.

A call for change at the top of the CHP was led by Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoğlu, one of the party’s most prominent figures and an outspoken critic of how the party ran May’s election campaign.

Others also complained that the secularist CHP had become undemocratic, with too much power in the leader’s hands.

Özel had spent a large part of his career working as a private pharmacist in the socially liberal Aegean resort city of Izmir.

He eventually became head of Türkiye’s pharmacy association and was elected to parliament in 2011.

The bespectacled 49-year-old German speaker won the final ballot by an 812-536 margin after promoting himself as the candidate for "change."