Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his Justice and Development Party (AKP) suffered their worst defeat in local elections in more than 20 years, losing both Istanbul and Ankara’s mayoral races to opposition candidates.
Opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) narrowly won Istanbul’s mayor, Ekrem İmamoğlu, has emerged as Erdoğan’s main rival for national influence, receiving the most votes in the popular vote for the first time in decades. As of Monday morning, the CHP had 37% of the vote, while the AKP had 36%.
Some observers believe the CHP has rewritten the political map enough to negate Mr. Erdoğan’s hopes of rewriting the constitution to win re-election in 2028. The AKP’s parliamentary majority is no longer large enough to pass a new constitution without a referendum, and the result suggests Mr Erdogan will be defeated.
President Erdoğan tried to take a positive view of the election results, but as a result the CHP pick out 15 mayor’s offices and 36 local governments.
“March 31st is not the end for us, but a turning point. In municipal elections, the Turkish state once again used the ballot box as an opportunity to get its message across to politicians,” the president said. Said.
“Regardless of the outcome, the winner of this election is primarily our democracy, the will of the people. Regardless of party affiliation, all 85 million people won the electoral marathon and Turkey was the winner before the candidates. “It became,” he said.
President Erdoğan: “Unfortunately, nine months after our victory in the May 28 elections, we did not achieve the desired results in the tests of local elections.” Admittedrefers to his latest re-election victory Mr. Erdoğan has now held either the prime minister or the presidential position for more than 20 years.
“We will correct our mistakes and correct our shortcomings,” he promised.
Istanbul Metropolitan Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu of the Republican People’s Party (CHP), who was elected mayor on March 31, 2024, greets residents in Saracane city (MERT CAN BUKULMEZ/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images)
President Erdoğan won a surprise landslide victory over CHP leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu, who was backed by an uneasy opposition coalition and appeared well-positioned to exploit public dissatisfaction with Erdoğan’s response. He succeeded and was re-elected. devastating earthquake February 2023.
The party fared well on Sunday, though Erdogan ultimately defeated Kilicdaroglu 52-47 after performing surprisingly well in the earthquake-hit region. behind Polling numbers suggest voters are more angry about high inflation and cultural issues than pollsters expected.
İmamoğlu outperformed in Istanbul, turning a relatively young former businessman into the CHP’s new political star. Mr. Erdogan himself was born in Istanbul and nurtured his national political ambitions in the mayor’s office.
Imamoglu Said Istanbul voters “opened the door to a new future” with his victory speech.
“Starting tomorrow, Turkey will be a different Turkey. You have opened the door to the rise of democracy, equality and freedom,” he said. Some of Erdogan’s supporters responded by shouting for him to resign immediately.
In the capital Ankara, CHP candidate Mansour Yabas won by a wide margin. declared victory before half of the votes were counted. His jubilant supporters filled the streets with cars, honking their horns like crazy and waving party flags.
Meanwhile, Istanbul was decorated with posters of Imammoğlu and Kemal Ataturk, founder of the modern Turkish secular state. Imamoğlu’s supporters portray Erdoğan as the heir to Ataturk’s revolution, as he seeks to erase Ataturk’s legacy and re-Islamize the country.
sunday election is more than doubled The number of female mayors in Turkey is another sign that President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Islamist grip on Turkish politics may be declining. Most of the new female mayors were members of the more secular party CHP, and several were members of the pro-Kurdish party People’s Democratic Party (DEM). I was stripped of my seat. This is because Erdogan’s government is believed to have ties to Kurdish separatist extremists.
Burju Koksar, one of the victorious CHP female mayors, actually ran on a promise to keep the DEM party out of her city of Afyonkarahisar. Koksar became the first woman and the first CHP candidate to win a mayoral election.
