Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar’s campaign to be re-elected to the role on Wednesday night won the endorsement of a third political party, ruling coalition party the DP.

The DP’s endorsement means that all three of the parties in the north’s ruling coalition have now endorsed Tatar for re-election ahead of this October’s elections, with the largest party, the UBP, having already endorsed Tatar’s campaign in April, and the YDP having followed suit last week.

The announcement also means the DP will not endorse the campaign of its former leader Serdar Denktash, the son of late Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash, who is set to run for election in October, and also announced his intention to create a new political party, having left the DP in 2020.

Tatar had been a member of the UBP until his election in October 2020, with the ‘TRNC’s’ constitution requiring that elected Turkish Cypriot leaders relieve themselves of party political ties upon entering office. As such, he will officially run in October as an independent.

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He had said after winning the UBP’s endorsement last month that his heart “is always with the UBP”, and added that during his term in office so far, “we have been successful in bringing this onto the world’s agenda”.

Tatar has for much of the year so far been trading the lead in polling for the election with opposition political party CTP leader and former ‘prime minister’ Tufan Erhurman.

Erhurman was announced as the CTP’s candidate during the party’s conference last month. This October’s election will also be his second run for the office, with him having finished third in 2020, winning just shy of 21.7 per cent of the vote, and endorsing then incumbent Mustafa Akinci in the second round.

Tatar and Erhurman have been trading the lead in election polling, with the most recent poll, conducted by Turkish research company Genar and published last month, seeing Tatar lead the way, polling at 37.9 per cent, while Erhurman remains close behind on 36 per cent of the vote.

Were Tatar to win re-election, he would be the first Turkish Cypriot leader to do so since Rauf Denktash won by default in 2000 after his second-round opponent Dervish Eroglu withdrew his candidacy.

Since then, Denktash did not stand for re-election and was replaced by Mehmet Ali Talat in 2005, Talat was beaten by Eroglu in 2010, Eroglu was beaten by Mustafa Akinci in 2015, and Akinci was beaten by Tatar in 2020.