Turkish daily Yeni Şafak has published a poll conducted by Denge Research Company on upcoming local elections in Istanbul, where AK Party has named incumbent Kadir Topbaş as their candidate and the Republican People's Party (CHP) selected Mustafa Sarıgül to vie for the city's top political office.

Many CHP members oppose Sarıgül's candidacy after he publicly squared off with former CHP leader Deniz Baykal in 2005, yet, CHP needing a strong figure to challenge in Istanbul, chose Sarıgül and adopted the slogan "Only solution is Sarıgül."

However, the recently conducted poll indicates that Sarıgül will not be able to obtain as many votes as CHP first expected.

According to the results, 33.3 percent of respondents said they would vote for Sarıgül while 47.7 percent said they favored AK Party's Topbaş.

The poll also indicated that 27.4 percent of CHP voters said that they did not believe in that CHP will win the elections in Istanbul while 12.1 percent of CHP voters said that they believe Topbaş will win the elections.

In addition, 38.4 percent of those polled said that they did not believe in Sarıgül's promises, including shutting down the football team Istanbul Büyükşehir Beledeiye Spor, which is financed by the municipality.


Istanbul / Sabah English