Selahattin Demirtaş Selahattin Demirtaş (born 10 April 1973) is a Kurdish politician, lawyer and author. He was the co-leader of the left-wing pro- Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), serving alongside Figen Yüksekdağ from 2014 to 2018. Selahattin Demirt ...

was officially announced as the candidate of the People's Democratic Party (HDP) on 4 May 2018, after members of the party had hinted at his candidacy weeks in advance. Party leader

Pervin Buldan Pervin Buldan (born 6 November 1967) is a Kurdish politician from Turkey. She was a member of the Democratic Society Party (DTP). She was President of Yakay-Der and one of the deputy speakers in the 26th Parliament of Turkey. On 11 February 2 ...

declared that Demirtaş, a jailed former co-chair of the HDP, would be leading a five-party "Kurdish alliance" into the general election.

Program

*Defending “No” for the

2017 Turkish constitutional referendum A constitutional referendum was held in Turkey on 16 April 2017 on whether to approve 18 proposed amendments to the Turkish constitution that were brought forward by the governing Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the Nationalist Movemen ...

18 proposed amendments
to the

Constitution of Turkey The Constitution of Turkey, formally known as the Constitution of the Republic of Türkiye (), and informally as the Constitution of 1982 (), is Turkey's fundamental law. It establishes the organization of the government, and sets out the pr ...

( Full details) * More Minority and Women’s rights * Building a country without

Capitalism Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their use for the purpose of obtaining profit. This socioeconomic system has developed historically through several stages and is defined by ...

* The support of Turkish membership of the European Union

Foreign policy

European Union–Turkey relations Relations between the European Union (EU) and Turkey were established in 1959, and the institutional framework was formalized with the 1963 Ankara Agreement. Although not a member state of the European Union, Turkey is one of the EU's main pa ...

, Demirtaş is known for his long-time support for Turkey’s EU accession process, focusing on the pledge to uphold human rights, local democracy, separation of powers and the rule of law as the main tenets of his future presidency. He distinguishes himself from other candidates in his unwavering criticism of what he sees as Brussels's neo-liberal economic agenda.

Program

Foreign policy

Election Result

Party Representation

Notes

References