Turkey’s main opposition party candidate took a narrow lead in the capital Ankara in Sunday’s local elections, early results showed, with President Tayyip Erdogan’s AK Party leading the race in Istanbul.
Mansur Yavas of the secularist opposition Republican People’s Party had 49.1 percent of the vote in Ankara, one percentage point more than AKP former minister Mehmet Ozhaseki, with just under half of ballot boxes opened in the capital.
In Istanbul, AKP candidate and former prime minister Binali Yildirim had 51.0 percent of votes after around two thirds of ballot boxes were opened, broadcaster NTV said.
Erdogan, who has dominated Turkish politics for more than 16 years thanks in part to strong economic growth, has become the country’s most popular, yet also most divisive, modern leader. He described the vote as a matter of survival for Turkey.
With the economy contracting following a currency crisis last year in which the lira lost more than 30 percent of its value, some voters appeared ready to punish Erdogan, who has ruled with an increasingly uncompromising stance.
“I was actually not going to vote today, but when I saw how much they (AKP) were flailing, I thought this might be time to land them a blow. Everyone is unhappy. Everyone is struggling,” said 47-year-old Hakan after voting in Ankara.
As authorities again scrambled to shore up the lira over the last week, Erdogan cast the country’s economic woes as resulting from attacks by the West, saying Turkey would overcome its troubles and adding he was “the boss” of the economy. “The aim behind the increasing attacks towards our country ahead of the elections is to block the road of the big, strong Turkey,” Erdogan told a rally in Istanbul on Saturday.