Nail-biter Turkish elections move to round 2 as majority evades Erdogan

ANKARA, Turkey — Turkey’s presidential election appeared headed for a second round on Sunday after the incumbent president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, failed to secure a majority of the vote. career.

The outcome of the vote set the stage for one two-week battle between Mr Erdogan and opposition leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu to secure victory in a May 28 runoff that could reshape Turkey’s political landscape.

With the unofficial count nearing completion, Erdogan received 49.4 percent of the vote to Mr Kilicdaroglu’s 44.8 percent, according to the state-run Anadolu news agency.

But both sides claimed to be at the forefront.

“Although the final results are not yet known, we are well ahead,” Erdogan told supporters gathered outside his party’s headquarters in Ankara, the capital.

Speaking at his own party headquarters, Mr Kilicdaroglu said the vote would express the “will of the nation”. He said, “We are here, every vote is counted.”

The competing claims came early Monday after a nerve-racking night in which each camp accused the other of announcing misleading information. Mr Erdogan warned the opposition on Twitter against “appropriating the national will” and called on his party supporters “not to leave the polling stations, come what may, until the results are final.”

Opposition politicians disputed the preliminary totals reported by Anadolu, saying their own figures straight from polling stations showed Mr Kilicdaroglu in the lead.

At stake is the course of a NATO member that has managed to upset many of its Western allies by maintaining warm ties with the Kremlin. One of the world’s 20 largest economies, Turkey has a range of political and economic ties that span Asia, Africa, Europe and the Middle East, and its domestic and foreign policies could change dramatically depending on who wins.

After becoming prime minister in 2003, he led a period of massive economic growth that transformed Turkish cities and lifted millions of Turks out of poverty. He was hailed internationally as a new model of a democratic Islamist, someone who was pro-business and wanted strong ties with the West.

But over the past decade, critics of Mr Erdogan have grown, both at home and abroad. In 2013, he faced massive protests against his style of government and in 2016, two years after becoming president, he survived an attempted coup. Gradually, he seized opportunities to sideline rivals and gain more power, accusing the political opposition of leading the country toward autocracy.

Since 2018, a declining currency and inflation that, according to official figures, exceeded 80 percent last year and was 44 percent last month, have eroded the value of Turkish savings and salaries.

Mr Erdogan’s failure to win a victory in Sunday’s first round of voting confirmed a decline in his standing among voters angry at his stewardship of the economy and consolidation of power. In his last election, in 2018, he won outright against three other candidates with 53 percent of the vote. His nearest challenger got 31 percent.

On Sunday, a voter, Fatma Cay, said said she had supported Erdogan in the past but didn’t this time, in part because she was angry at how expensive foods like onions had become.

“He’s forgotten where he came from,” said Ms. Cay, 70. “This nation can lift someone up, but we also know how to bring someone down.”

Still, she did not return to Mr Kilicdaroglu, voting instead for a third candidate, Sinan Ogan, who received about 5 percent of the vote. The elimination of Mr. Ogan would mr. could give Erdogan a lead in the second round as Mr. Ogan will rather prefer him.

Mr Erdogan remains popular with rural, working-class and religious voters, who praise him for developing the country, strengthening its international status and expanding the rights of devout Muslims in Turkey’s staunchly secular state.

“We just love Erdogan,” said Halil Karaaslan, a pensioner. “He built everything: roads, bridges and drones. People are comfortable and at peace.”

That, Mr. Karaaslan said, was more important than rising prices. “There is no economic crisis,” he said. “Sure, things are expensive, but the salaries are almost as high. It balances.”

To capitalize on voters’ frustration, a coalition of six opposition parties came together to challenge Mr Erdogan and support a joint candidate, Mr Kilicdaroglu.

Mr Kilicdaroglu, a former civil servant who ran Turkey’s social security administration before leading Turkey’s largest opposition party, campaigned as the antithesis of Mr Erdogan. Contrary to Erdogan’s tough rhetoric, Mr. Kilicdaroglu filmed campaign videos in his modest kitchen, talking about everyday issues such as the price of onions.

Sunday’s vote was also held to determine the composition of Turkey’s 600-member parliament, though results for those seats were not expected until Monday. The parliament lost a lot of power when the country switched to a presidential system after an Erdogan-backed referendum in 2017. The opposition has vowed to return the country to a parliamentary system.

Adding to the importance of these elections for many Turks is that 2023 marks the 100th anniversary of the country’s establishment as a republic following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. A national celebration is planned for the anniversary, on October 29, and the president will preside over it.

The elections were also prompted by issues that have long polarized Turkish society, such as the right place for religion in a state committed to strict secularism. In his 11 years as Prime Minister and nine years as President, Mr. Erdogan expanded religious education and relaxed rules restricting religious dress.

Derya Akca, 29, cited her desire to cover her hair as the main reason she supported Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party. “They are defending my freedom to wear a headscarf, which is the most important factor for me,” says Ms. Akca, who works in a clothing store in Istanbul.

She recalled being so embarrassed after a college professor humiliated her in front of the class that she dropped out of school, a decision she now regrets. “I felt like an outsider,” she said. “I now wish I had stayed and fought.”

But elsewhere in the city, Deniz Deniz, the co-owner of a bar popular with the city’s LGBTQ community, lamented how the number of such establishments had dwindled over the past decade of Erdogan’s tenure.

“I want to change so bad,” Mr. Deniz said. “I want a country where LGBT+ people and women are not rejected. I want an egalitarian and democratic country.”

In Turkey’s southern region, devastated by powerful earthquakes in February that killed more than 50,000 people, many voters expressed anger at the government’s reaction at the polls.

“We had an earthquake and the government didn’t even intervene,” said Rasim Dayanir, an earthquake survivor who voted for Mr. Kilicdaroglu. “But our decision was made before the earthquake.”

Mr Dayanir, 25, had fled the city of Antakya, which was largely destroyed by the earthquake, but returned with eight family members to vote on Sunday.

He stood in the midst of hundreds of voters lining up to vote in an elementary school. Others cast their votes in shipping containers set up to replace destroyed polling stations. Mr. Dayanir said his uncle, aunt and other members of his family were killed in the earthquake.

“We are hopeful,” he said. “We believe in change.”

Ben Hubbard reported from Ankara, and Gulsin Harman from Istanbul. Reporting contributed by Elif Inc from Istanbul, Safak Timur from Ankara and Nimet Kirac from Antakya.