The Peoples' Equality and Democracy Party (DEM) will field its own candidate for the mayoral election in Istanbul, according to the party spokesperson Ayşegül Doğan’s announcement at a press conference in Ankara on Sunday.

Local elections will be held in Turkey on 31 March. The DEM Party wants to end the regime of trustee administration and has had its mayoral candidates in the Kurdish regions determined by the party base in primary elections. Whether candidates would be nominated in the west of Turkey was up for discussion for a long time. As Ayşegül Doğan explained, the central executive council of the DEM discussed this issue in a meeting that lasted for hours. In the end, the party decided to run with its own candidates. "The DEM time has come for Istanbul and Turkey. By DEM time, we mean that it is time for equality, freedom, justice and peace."

The candidates for Istanbul and other cities in Turkey are to be finalised by 9 February. When asked whether Başak Demirtaş would run for Istanbul, Doğan replied that the line-up had not yet been finalised. Başak Demirtaş, who is married to the imprisoned former HDP leader Selahattin Demirtaş, is one of the possible candidates for Istanbul.