Next Turkish PM to be announced on Aug 21: Erdoğan

President-elect Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has said he will conclude his consultations regarding the party’s future leadership with Justice and Development Party (AKP) officials next week.

Erdoğan also said the next chairman and prime minister will be announced Aug. 21, nearly a week before the presidential handover.

“We are going to hold our Central Executive Board [MYK] meeting next Thursday [Aug. 21]. We’ll discuss this issue again there. We’ll declare the common individual to be determined by our party’s relevant bodies after this meeting,” Erdoğan told journalists late Aug. 14 on the sidelines of a reception held at the AKP headquarters on the occasion of the 13th anniversary of the foundation of the party.

Erdoğan spent the entire day in consultation on Aug. 14, first with expanded provincial chairs, mayors and other party officials and then with his lawmakers later in the day. Erdoğan will continue these steps through the next week, but Aug. 21’s meeting will be decisive in selecting the AKP’s next chairman, and thus the next prime minister. The party will hold its extraordinary convention on Aug. 27 to officially elect the next chairman, a day before Erdoğan takes the office from outgoing President Abdullah Gül.

Erdoğan will take his presidential oath on Aug. 28 and said he will give the mandate for the formation of the new government to the new prime minister on Aug. 29. The next chairman will take the party to the 2015 parliamentary elections and then the party’s ordinary convention will be held in late 2015, Erdoğan stressed.

Upon a question, Erdoğan dismissed concerns regarding the party’s future in his absence, but said there could...