Turkey’s ruling party is set to replace Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu at an extraordinary congress in the coming weeks, Reuters reported on Wednesday, signaling the end of his term as premier and plunging the country into political uncertainty.

As Soner Cagaptay, director of the Turkish research program at the Washington Institute, pointed out that move was the next step in a “hollowing out” of Turkish institutions by Erdogan who already controls the army and parliament. “It shows how much power has been massed in one person’s hands,” he told AFP, adding that Erdogan was now exercising more control than anyone in Turkey’s modern democratic history. Moreover, the departure of Davutoglu would “allow Erdogan to distance himself from some of his failed policies that can be attributed to Davutoglu,”

The decision was confirmed to Reuters by five AK Party officials and came after a meeting of more than 1-1/2 hours between Davutoglu and President Tayyip Erdogan after weeks of increasingly public tension between the two men.

Erdogan wants an executive presidency in Turkey to replace the current parliamentary system, a plan which Davutoglu did not seem to be willing to support.

The next Turkish prime minister will be more loyal to Erdogan, Turkish journalists comment, while potential successors of Davutoglu include transport minister Binali Yıldırım and energy minister Berat Albayrak, who is married to Erdogan’s eldest daughter.