Recep Tayyip Erdogan concedes historic victory for the opposition, “a turning point” according to him

Sunday’s vote marks the worst defeat for the Turkish president and his Islamo-conservative party, the AKP, in power for 22 years.

“We didn’t get the results we wanted.” Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan conceded “a turning point” for his camp, Sunday March 31, after the historic victory of the opposition in the municipal elections. The counting of nearly 99% of ballot boxes nationwide confirms that his Islamo-conservative party, the AKP, in power since 2002, suffered its worst electoral debacle in two decades. The announcement of the final results is expected on Monday.

The main opposition party, the CHP, claimed victory in Istanbul and Ankara, Turkey’s two largest cities. For many observers, the mayor of IstanbulEkrem Imamoglu, very popular, now has a route to the 2028 presidential election. The CHP, a social democratic party, has won many other town halls, such as in Bursa, an important industrial city in the north-west of the country, which was acquired by the AKP since 2004. In addition to Izmir, the country’s third city and stronghold of the CHP in the west, and Antalya, in the south, the first opposition movement has made a spectacular breakthrough in Anatolia. He is leading the race in provincial capitals long held by the AKP, taking observers by surprise.

Erdogan promises to “respect the decision of the Nation”

“The voters chose to change the face of Turkey”welcomed the leader of the CHP, Ozgur Ozel. “Those who have been ignored have sent a clear message to those who run this country”, added the CHP mayor of Ankara, Mansur Yavas. From his party headquarters in Ankara, in front of a dejected and unusually silent crowd, the Turkish president promised to “respect the decision of the Nation”. Resigned, he mentioned the “four years of work (…) not to be wasted” by 2028, a way of ruling out the possibility of an early election which would allow him to run again.

Recep Tayyip Erdogan, 70, had thrown his weight behind the campaign, particularly in Istanbul, on “jewel” of the country, of which he was mayor in the 1990s and who switched to the opposition in 2019. He had a series of daily meetings, benefiting from unlimited air time on public television, when his opponents were almost there. private. But the commitment of the Head of State, who announced at the beginning of March that these elections were “his last”was not enough.

The AKP candidates, however, remained in the lead in several large cities in Anatolia (Konya, Kayseri, Erzurum) and the Black Sea (Rize, Trabzon), strongholds of President Erdogan. The pro-Kurdish DEM party has secured a comfortable lead in several large cities in the Kurdish-majority South-East, including Diyarbakir, the informal capital of Turkey’s Kurds.