ANKARA, Turkey (AP) – Conservative Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan He faces a run-off with his main rival in two weeks that will decide who leads a country battling hyperinflation and hosting Syrian refugees because it plays a key role in the Middle East and in NATO expansion..
The second round from May 28 will allow Turks to decide whether their country will remain under the president’s increasingly authoritarian grip for a third decade, election officials said Monday, or whether it can embark on the more democratic path promised by Kemal Kilicdaroglu..
Some voters commented that the vote shows how deeply polarized Türkiye has become.
“I’m not happy at all,” said voter Susan Doltzah. “I worry about the future of Türkiye.”
Erdogan faced electoral headwinds over the cost of living crisis and criticism over the government’s response to the devastating February earthquake..
The nationalist’s decline was still less pronounced than expected. But with his coalition maintaining its hold on Parliament, he is now in a good position to win in the second round.
Erdogan voter Engin Duran said, “On May 28, God willing, if Recep Tayyip Erdogan lives up to expectations, he will win.”
As in previous years, Erdogan has led a deeply divided campaign.
He depicted Kilicdaroglu, who had the support of the country’s pro-Kurdish party, in collusion with “terrorists” and supporting what he called “perverted” LGBT rights.
In an effort to appeal to voters hard hit by inflation, he has increased wages, pensions and subsidized electricity and gas bills, while showcasing Turkey’s domestic defense industries and infrastructure projects.
Kilicdaroglu campaigned on promises to reverse crackdowns on freedom of speech and other forms of democratic backsliding, as well as fix an economy battered by high inflation and currency depreciation.
But as the results came in, it appeared that these items weren’t quite as shaken up in the electorate as might have been expected. Conservatives in Turkey’s heartland voted overwhelmingly for the ruling party, with the main opposition in Kilicdaroglu winning most of the coastal provinces in the west and south. The pro-Kurdish Green Left Party, YSP, won the Kurdish-majority counties in the southeast.
Uncertainty sent Turkey’s main stock exchange, the BIST-100, down more than 6% at Monday’s open, prompting a pause in trading. Although stocks recovered briefly during the day, the index returned to initial lows near closing time.
Western countries and foreign investors were particularly interested in the outcome due to Erdoğan’s unorthodox leadership of the economy and his mercurial but often successful efforts to put the country that straddles Europe and Asia at the center of several major diplomatic negotiations..
Preliminary results showed that Erdogan won 49.5% of Sunday’s votes. While Kilicdaroglu received 44.9%, and the third candidate, Sinan Ogan, received 5.2%, according to Ahmet Yener, head of the Supreme Electoral Commission.
Yener said the remaining uncounted votes were not enough to propel Erdogan to complete victory, even if they all disagreed with him. In the last presidential elections in 2018, Erdogan won the first round with more than 52% of the vote.
Even as it became clear that a runoff was likely, Erdogan, who has ruled Turkey either as prime minister or president since 2003, described Sunday’s vote as a victory for him and the country.
“Not finalizing the election results does not change the fact that the nation has chosen us,” Erdogan, 69, told his supporters in the early hours of Monday.
He said he would respect the nation’s decision.
Kilicdaroglu sounded optimistic, tweeting around the time the runoff was announced: “Don’t fall into despair…we will stand up and win this election together.”
Kilicdaroglu, 74, and his party have lost all previous presidential and parliamentary elections since taking over the leadership in 2010, but this time they increased their votes.
The right-wing candidate Ogan did not say who he would endorse if the election went to a second round. It is believed that he has received support from nationalist voters who want change after two decades of Erdogan’s rule, but he is not convinced of the ability of the six-party alliance led by Kilicdaroglu to govern.
The election results showed that the coalition led by Erdogan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) looked set to retain a majority in the 600-seat parliament, although the assembly lost much of its power after a referendum granting the presidency additional legislative powers narrowly passed. in 2017.
Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party and its allies won 321 seats in the National Assembly, while the opposition won 213 and the remaining 66 seats went to a pro-Kurdish alliance, according to preliminary results.
These results will likely give Erdogan an advantage in the final runoff because voters will not want a “divided government,” said Howard Eisenstadt, an associate professor of Middle East history and politics at St. Lawrence University in New York.
The results, reported by the state-run Anadolu Agency, showed that Erdogan’s party dominates the quake-hit region, winning 10 out of 11 provinces in a region that has traditionally supported the president. That was despite criticism of his government’s slow response to the 7.8-magnitude earthquake, which killed more than 50,000 people.
Nearly 89% of eligible voters in Turkey cast their ballots and more than half of all overseas voters went to the polls. Voter turnout in Turkey is usually strong, despite the government’s crackdown on freedom of expression and assembly over the years and especially since the 2016 coup attempt.
Blaming the failed coup attempt on followers of a former ally, the cleric Fethullah Gulen, Erdogan has embarked on a massive crackdown on civil servants with alleged ties to Gulen, jailing pro-Kurdish activists, journalists and politicians.
Turkish democracy has proven to be amazingly resilient. These elections have been very popular and offer real choice,” said Frank Schwab who headed a delegation from the Council of Europe to observe the elections. But he added that the country does not abide by “the basic principles of holding democratic elections”.
Michael George Lynk, special coordinator and leader of the OSCE monitoring mission observing the elections, said the election was competitive but limited.
He explained that “the criminalization of some political forces, including the arrest of many opposition politicians, prevented full political pluralism, and impeded the rights of individuals to run for elections.”
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Belgensoy reported from Istanbul. Associated Press writer Cinar Kebir contributed from Bodrum, Türkiye.
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