HMM: In Shakeup at Turkish Soccer Club, a Worrisome Sign for Erdogan?

A leadership change at a Turkish sports club has sent a message rife with political undertones, with some seeing the ouster of its longtime chairman as a sign of a tide turning against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, three weeks before he stands for reelection himself.

Ali Koc, the youngest son of Turkey’s richest family, was elected chairman of Fenerbahce, ending Aziz Yildirim’s 20-year tenure. Fenerbahce, one of Turkey’s so-called “big three” soccer clubs, is Erdogan’s favored team and has been at the center of political jockeying by various factions for several years. Koc won in a landslide – the 51-year-old garnered more than 16,000 of the 20,736 votes cast — suggesting that Yildirim supporters turned against him.

“The Fenerbahce family has carried out change, now it’s time for the big change in Turkey,” tweeted Muharrem Ince, the main opposition Republican People’s Party’s candidate for president at elections scheduled for June 24. Temel Karamollaoglu, another opposition candidate, tweeted that nobody could have predicted that the long-time Fenerbahce incumbent would be overthrown by a “deep wave.”

“In my opinion, the same will happen at the elections,” he said.

Stay tuned…