ANKARA, Turkey (Reuters) — Turkey’s presidential election will be decided in a runoff, election officials said, after incumbent Recep Tayyip Erdogan pulled ahead of his chief challenger, but fell short of an outright victory that would extend his increasingly authoritarian rule into a third decade.
The May 28 second-round vote will determine whether the strategically located NATO country remains under the president’s firm grip or can embark on a more democratic course promised by his main rival, Kemal Kilicdaroglu.
The uncertainty drove the main Turkish stock exchange BIST-100 more than 6% lower at the open Monday, prompting a temporary halt in trading. But stocks recovered somewhat after trading resumed, with the index falling 2.5% in the afternoon from Friday’s close.
Given Erdoğan’s unconventional business leadership and often insane but successful efforts to put Turkey at the center of many important diplomatic negotiations, Western countries and foreign investors are optimistic about this result. was particularly interested in Located at the crossroads of East and West on the Black Sea coast and bordering Iran, Iraq and Syria, Turkey has played a major role in issues such as the Syrian war, migration flows to Europe, Ukraine’s grain exports and NATO expansion.
Supreme Electoral Commission chairman Ahmet Yener said preliminary results gave Erdogan 49.51 percent, Kirikdaroglu 44.88 percent and third candidate Sinan Ogan 5.17 percent.
In the last presidential election in 2018, Mr. Erdogan swept the first round with 52.6% of the vote. Erdogan, who has ruled Turkey as prime minister or president since 2003, said Sunday’s vote was a victory for both himself and the country, despite the possibility of a run-off vote becoming clear.
“The fact that the election results are not yet known does not change the fact that the people voted for us,” Erdogan, 69, told his supporters early Monday morning.
He said he respects the country’s decision. Kirikudarogur seemed to expect victory.
“We will definitely win the second round and bring democracy,” said 74-year-old Kirikdaroglu, arguing that Erdogan had lost the public’s trust for change.
Kirikdaroglu and his party, who have lost all previous presidential and parliamentary elections since taking office in 2010, have managed to win more votes this time. Erdogan’s AKP and its allies secured 321 seats in the National Assembly, while the opposition won 213 and the 66 remaining went to a pro-Kurdish alliance, according to preliminary results.
But as the results came in, it appeared those elements didn’t shake up the electorate as expected:Turkey’s conservative heartland overwhelmingly voted for the ruling party, with Kilicdaroglu’s main opposition winning most of the coastal provinces in the west and south. The pro-Kurdish green left-wing YSP has won the Kurdish-majority southeastern provinces.
The results, reported by the state-run Anadolu News Agency, showed Mr Erdogan’s party was dominant in the quake-hit areas, winning 10 of the 11 states that traditionally supported the president. This comes despite criticism of the country’s government for its slow response to the 7.8-magnitude quake that killed more than 50,000 people.
More than 64 million people, including foreign voters, were eligible to vote, and almost 89% voted. This year marks the 100th anniversary of the founding of Turkey, a modern, secular nation born out of the rubble of the Ottoman Empire. Turkey has traditionally had high voter turnout, but the government has long suppressed freedom of expression and assembly, especially since the failed coup in 2016. Erdogan blamed supporters of former ally cleric Fethullah Gulen for the failed coup and launched a full-scale crackdown on officials suspected of having ties to Gulen and pro-Kurdish politicians.
Critics say the president’s tough stance is responsible for the painful cost of living crisis. The latest official data showed inflation at about 44%, down from a peak of about 86%. The price of vegetables has become an issue in the opposition campaign, which used the onion as a symbol.
