Turkey’s main opposition party won a landslide victory in Turkey’s local elections on Sunday, dealing an unexpected blow to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government in the capital Ankara and Istanbul, where Ekrem İmamoğlu secured a second term as mayor. maintained control of major cities.
“Dear people of Istanbul, today you have opened the door to a new future,” Imamoglu told jubilant supporters of the opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) as he declared victory. . “Starting tomorrow, Turkey will be a different Turkey. You opened the door to the rise of democracy, equality and freedom… You lit a flame of hope at the ballot box.”
As the night wore on, a good turnout favored the opposition, and the CHP secured control of large swaths of western Turkey and more conservative bordering states in the Black Sea and central Anatolia, traditionally seen as hostile to its policies. won in a number of areas.
The result quickly became a symbol of dissatisfaction with President Erdogan, who began rallying his supporters to take part in local elections soon after he was elected president last year.
Erdogan has been at the forefront of his party’s campaign to take back Istanbul, holding rallies in the city the week before the vote and attending prayers at Istanbul’s iconic Hagia Sophia Mosque the night before the vote.
“These election results show that voters are determined to establish a new politics in Turkey.” Said CHP leader Ozgür Ozer addressed the nation with tears in his eyes.
In a calm address to a subdued crowd outside the party’s headquarters in Ankara, Erdogan praised the vote itself, not the result. “Regardless of the outcome, the winner of this election is first and foremost democracy,” he said.
“Unfortunately, we did not get the results we wanted in the local elections…Everything happens for a reason. We will rebuild trust in the places where our country has elected others.”
Erdogan addressed most of his comments to the audience, at one point saying, “I love you with all my heart.”
Turkish opposition star İmamoğlu defeated his rival Murat Kurum, a former bureaucrat and environment minister from Erdoğan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP), by a wide margin in Turkey’s largest city, where the mayorship is at stake. Ta. President of Türkiye. With a majority of votes counted, Istanbul’s mayor is expected to beat Krum by 10 percentage points.
Across Istanbul, motorists honked their car horns in celebration. video displayed People celebrate by tearing down posters with Klum’s face on them.
“This result will put İmamoğlu and the People’s Party at the center of Turkish politics,” said Yusuf Can, an analyst at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington.
President Erdogan called for a repeat of Imammoğlu’s first victory in the 2019 election, which led to a second victory for the opposition mayor. As a result, he has been catapulted from being a minor local government official to the role of the main challenger to Erdogan’s government. His second major victory is expected to put Imammoğlu on the path to the presidential election.
The mayor’s campaign for a second term was extremely difficult. In Istanbul, the country’s financial and cultural capital, where Erdogan was mayor 30 years ago, Erdogan’s AKP spent more than three times as much as Imamoglu and the CHP, election officials said. It is estimated that
Even though Erdogan’s name is not on the ballot, voters across the country are seizing the opportunity to express their dissatisfaction with his policies, with many blaming Turkey’s economic slump on opposition parties or even more to the right than Erdogan. He cited the rise of small parties as a motivation for voting. AKP.
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“This is a heart-touching message,” said Selim Sazak, head of Ankara-based consultancy firm Sanda Global, which advised several campaigns during the local elections. “Voters are telling the government that the economy is really hurting.”
Their message was that if the CHP had chosen them as presidential candidates last year, either Imamoglu or Ankara Mayor Mansur Yavash could have delivered a similar landslide victory for the opposition, he said. added.
The AKP selected Murat Kurum, a former environment minister born and raised in Ankara, to contest the charismatic Istanbul mayor’s seat, which President Erdoğan held from 1994 to 1998. This only reinforced the impression that they were trying to bring it back into the realm of government. influence.
But some of Mr. Klum’s recent attacks on Imamour have backfired. In particular, his decision to tell Imamoğlu to “run a meatball shop,” after a popular Turkish staple, backfired.
İmamoğlu heavily used Krum’s comments on the election campaign as evidence that his challenger was outside the average Istanbulite. tell Crowd of supporters: “You know why I love this election? Meatball makers and ministers are equal. [at the ballot box]”
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s efforts to put himself at the forefront of the fight to retake Istanbul have backfired for many residents. Turkey has been plagued by an economic crisis linked to his policies, with populations in major cities being hit hardest.
“That son of a bitch caused his own inflation. That’s enough,” said one voter, Burhan, who asked that his last name not be used. He said he had previously voted for the AKP, but was still frustrated by the lack of economic development since Erdogan’s victory last year and chose Imamoglu this time.
After winning re-election, President Erdoğan appointed a new finance minister and central bank governor and introduced reforms and austerity measures that some observers consider essential, but as inflation continues to rise, many citizens’ Life got even worse.
