Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced on Sunday the selection of former Environment Minister Murat Kurum as the ruling Justice and Development Party's candidate for the Istanbul mayoral elections scheduled for next March, in an attempt to regain control of Turkey's largest city. Erdogan stated during the announcement ceremony for Kurum and other party candidates: "By working together, we will surely lift Istanbul out of the void of the past five years."
Kurum will compete against Ekrem İmamoğlu from the opposition Republican People's Party, who was elected mayor in 2019, ending a 25-year rule by the Justice and Development Party and its Islamist predecessors in Istanbul. Kurum (47 years old) served as Minister of Environment and Urban Development from July 2018 until June of the previous year, as he left his position after the elections. He was then elected as a member of parliament from Istanbul, Turkey's commercial center with a population of 16 million, or about 20 percent of the country's total population. Kurum was a prominent figure regarding the government's response to the devastating earthquakes that struck southern Turkey last February, claiming more than 50,000 lives.
