Turkiye was coming to terms on Monday with the opposition\u2019s unexpected success in local elections which saw it outperform President Recep Tayyip Erdogan\u2019s ruling party and add to municipalities gained five years ago. The main opposition, the centre-left Republican People\u2019s Party, or CHP, kept hold of Istanbul and the capital Ankara by wide margins but also added wins in conservative provinces such as Adiyaman in the south.<\/p>\n
The party won in 35 of Turkiye\u2019s 81 provinces \u2013 including the country\u2019s five most populous cities \u2013 while Erdogan\u2019s Islamic-oriented Justice and Development Party, or AKP, took 24. Crucially, the CHP took 37.7 per cent of the nationwide vote with nearly all the ballots counted. The AKP secured 35.5 per cent. The surprise results came just 10 months after the opposition was left divided and demoralised following a defeat in last year\u2019s presidential and parliamentary elections.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a huge turning point,\u201d Seda Demiralp, a political science professor at Isik University in Istanbul, said. \u201cThe CHP is no longer the opposition party in local government now \u2026 (Erdogan) is clearly aware that throughout Turkey voters sent a clear message, even in conservative cities. It\u2019s unbelievable, it\u2019s a huge deal. It\u2019s not just about local government, it\u2019s about voters saying they\u2019re not happy with the AK Party government.\u201d<\/p>\n
Turnout was around 78 per cent, according to the state-run Anadolu Agency, compared to 87 per cent last year. The results suggested that it was mostly AKP supporters who failed to vote, Demiralp said. Ozgur Unluhisarcikli, director of the German Marshall Fund in Ankara, described the results as unprecedented over Erdogan\u2019s two decades in power. \u201cWe have never seen him lose like this,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cNow the CHP is leading the AKP in the polls for the first time . This is a landslide for the CHP because they got more votes than the AKP for the first time.\u201d In south-east Turkiye, the pro-Kurdish Equality and Democracy Party took 10 provinces while the Erdogan-allied Nationalist Movement Party, or MHP, won eight scattered across the country. The New Welfare Party, or YRP, which largely competed with the AKP over the support of conservative voters, took two provinces. It was the third biggest party in terms of nationwide votes, taking 6.2 per cent.<\/p>\n
The IYI Party and the Great Unity Party won the remaining two provinces. Following last year\u2019s discouraging defeat, some had expected the opposition to perform poorly in Sunday\u2019s election. However, a change in leadership in the CHP \u2013 from the 75-year-old Kemal Kilicdaroglu to Ozgur Ozel, 49 \u2013 appeared to have revitalised the party and paved the way for incumbent CHP mayors and other candidates to secure conclusive victories.<\/p>\n
Analysts contrasted the strong candidates fielded by the opposition \u2013 such as Ekrem Imamoglu in Istanbul and Mansur Yavas in Ankara \u2013 to those standing for the AKP, largely overshadowed by Erdogan during the campaign. Imamoglu won by a margin of more than 11 points while Yavas secured a gap of nearly 29 points on his AKP rival. The results are set to boost Imamoglu\u2019s standing as a potential challenger for the presidency in 2028.<\/p>\n
\u201cLeadership is becoming more important than parties and ideologies,\u201d Demiralp said. \u201cEspecially in a country like Turkiye where institutions are weak, people connect to leaders rather than parties and other institutions.\u201d Sunday\u2019s election came amid an ongoing cost-of-living crisis with voters facing annual inflation that rose to 67 per cent in February. Meanwhile, Erdogan has allowed borrowing costs to rise to 50 per cent in a bid to combat soaring prices.<\/p>\n
Commentators said that although the economic crisis left Erdogan\u2019s popularity largely unaffected in last year\u2019s national polls, AKP voters felt more inclined to express discontent when his name was not on the ballot paper. \u201cThe high inflation, hubris, mediocre candidates, a poor electoral campaign, and being outflanked by its former ally \u2013 the New Welfare Party \u2013 are the main factors behind the AKP\u2019s defeat,\u201d Wolfango Piccoli, the co-president of New York-based consulting firm Teneo, said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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