Breaking News: Erdoğan's 'Izmir is different today' message: Cemil Tugay is officially in the AKP!

AKP Chairman and President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan attended the 'Legislative Year Opening Meeting with AKP Deputies' held at the AKP Congress Center.

Erdoğan and Izmir Metropolitan Municipality Mayor Cemil Tugay, who resigned from the CHP, sat side by side.

Addressing his party's deputies at the meeting, Erdoğan made evaluations within the scope of the new legislative year agenda.

Erdoğan's statements are as follows:

My dear nation, my esteemed deputy colleagues, our precious mayors, dear young people who are the guarantee of our future, distinguished ladies and gentlemen, I greet you with my most heartfelt feelings, respect, and affection. Through you, I send my respects and love to my citizens in every corner of our paradise homeland, and I embrace all our brothers and sisters abroad who turn their longing for home into a sense of belonging with yearning.

"IZMIR IS DIFFERENT TODAY"

I pray to Almighty Allah that this widely attended meeting, which we organized at our Headquarters on the occasion of the opening of the 5th Legislative Year of the 28th Term of the Grand National Assembly of Turkey, will be auspicious for our country, our nation, our party, and our democracy.

Izmir is different today, very enthusiastic. I thank all my brothers and sisters who graced our meeting for sharing the excitement of the new legislative year with us, and I say welcome to them. I wish the new legislative year, which began as of Thursday, to be auspicious, and I wish the AK Party group and our People's Alliance partners great success in this new legislative year from the Lord. Likewise, I convey my wishes for success to our parliament, to all political parties, and to all deputies without any discrimination.

FRAMEWORK LAW MESSAGE

I would like to reiterate a point I underlined in my address to the General Assembly of the Parliament today. Our Grand National Assembly had entered the recess by displaying an example of consensus unprecedented in our political history. We attach great importance to keeping the spirit of consensus represented by the 467 affirmative votes given to the framework law alive in the new legislative year. We need, more urgently than anything else, to create a social ground that will close the distances between different segments in our country.

"I FIND BAHÇELİ'S CALL EXTREMELY MEANINGFUL"

We hope that our proposal for competition within consensus will find a response and that Turkish politics will show that a new style of politics is possible in the new legislative year.

I always say this. For a functioning democracy, what the opposition does and how it behaves is just as important as the government and the government's actions. It is necessary for the opposition to support and contribute to our efforts with a constructive attitude, and to show the virtue of being able to meet on a common denominator in line with common goals by putting aside the war axes when necessary. As the AK Party and the People's Alliance, we have not shied away from compromise, dialogue, and the search for consensus on any issue that will be for the benefit of the nation, especially our 'Turkey without Terrorism' process. We will not shy away from it from now on either.

I find the call for "competition in service, unity in independence, effort in the future" made to political parties yesterday by our People's Alliance partner, Nationalist Movement Party Chairman Mr. Devlet Bahçeli, extremely meaningful in this respect, along with his statements that honor us.

I also thank him separately for his statements regarding us. Despite the attitude that was as ugly as it was lacking in courtesy at the opening of the Parliament, I want to see a more responsible tone from the opposition in the new legislative year. At the very least, I maintain my hope in this regard.

With this understanding, we will keep the doors of dialogue wide open, use a constructive language again in the commissions and General Assembly proceedings, and will not abandon common sense, sound judgment, and the culture of compromise. However, if we do not see a response to this well-intentioned approach of ours, our place of complaint will, as always, be our nation with its vast foresight and wisdom.

"WE ARE SWEATING TO OPEN TURKEY'S PATH AND HORIZON"

My precious fellow travelers and comrades, since our last meeting, we have all been in an intense effort as AK cadres to fulfill our duty to our nation. You, under the roof of the Grand National Assembly, we in the Presidency, and our mayors in their provinces and districts, are all sweating together with a spirit of complete dedication to open Turkey's path and horizon. We also tried to evaluate the holiday period, which started on August 10 and ended on October 1, in the most efficient way. From our ministers to our Deputy Chairmen, from our deputies to our board members, and to our provincial, district, and neighborhood organizations, we traveled city by city, district by district, street by street with all our cadres. We said, 'No stopping, keep going.' With the Turkey Meetings, we listened to the voices of our people from all walks of life, noted their criticisms, and received their recommendations on the point of serving them better.

As AK cadres, we are happy and proud because we serve our nation with love, passion, and sincerity. Young people, what does the late Namık Kemal say? "Those who know themselves as human do not tire of serving the public; those who are noble do not refrain from helping the oppressed." In other words, those who know themselves and know humanity do not tire of serving the public. Those who are brave do not refrain from helping the oppressed.

CEMIL TUGAY IS IN THE AKP

Cemil Tugay, who resigned from the CHP and continued his duty as an independent, has joined the AKP. President Erdoğan pinned the party badge on Tugay.