The race is being closely watched around the world. Kilicdaroglu has promised to usher Turkey, a NATO member, into a brand new period by revitalizing democracy after years of presidency repression and refreshing ties with Turkey’s allies within the West. For his half, Erdogan has tried to focus on the strides Turkey has taken below his rule, as a rustic modernized by megaprojects like bridges and airports and as a worldwide energy that produced navy weapons sought by overseas governments.
Lengthy traces have been seen at polling stations in Istanbul, Turkey’s largest metropolis, the place Erdogan voted Sunday morning. Kilicdaroglu forged his poll in Ankara, the capital, joined by town’s in style mayor. If neither candidate captures greater than 50 p.c within the voting Sunday, a runoff can be held Could 28.
Polls closed at 5 p.m. native time. Canan Kaftancioglu, a senior member of Kilicdaroglu’s get together, mentioned they anticipated “report” participation in Istanbul, of greater than 90 p.c of eligible voters. “There’s data that that is the case throughout Turkey,” she mentioned, including that they have been ready for ballots to be counted. The voting had occurred largely with out incident, apart from what she mentioned have been minor, particular person instances.
Turkish broadcasters, together with the state-run Anadolu information company, started sharing preliminary outcomes lower than two hours after the polls closed. “We’re forward,” Kilicdaroglu wrote on Twitter at 7:53 p.m. native time, at the same time as preliminary tallies carried by Anadolu confirmed Erdogan main.
Two of Kilicdaroglu’s surrogates held a information convention Sunday night the place they criticized Anadolu. The company’s status throughout elections was “under zero,” mentioned Ekrem Imamoglu, the mayor of Istanbul and a member of Kilicdaroglu’s get together. “We’re informing our residents to not give it any credit score.”
Opposition-friendly information shops confirmed outcomes transfer favorable to Kilicdaroglu, although all knowledge pointed to a detailed race and an extended evening of counting.
Earlier within the day, exterior a polling station within the Istanbul neighborhood of Kurtulus, Garip Cicek, a 48-year-old safety guard, mentioned he was ready “impatiently” for the night’s outcomes. “It’s essential for my nation,” he mentioned. He was voting for Erdogan, he mentioned, as a result of he supported the president’s improvement of the protection trade.
“This can be a matter of pleasure,” he mentioned. Throughout Erdogan’s 20 years in energy, he added, “many issues” had been achieved, together with the latest unveiling of the primary domestically produced electrical automobile.
“The result’s clear,” he mentioned, predicting an Erdogan win. “With God’s will, we will keep the place we’re.”
One other voter within the neighborhood was simply as satisfied that Kilicdaroglu would prevail and that Turkey couldn’t stay because it was. “I haven’t felt this excited or completely happy in such a very long time,” mentioned Ayse Kolikpinar, 33.
Sunday’s vote was like a “referendum” for Turkey, she mentioned: “Both we select the Republic or a one-man regime.”
The trauma of the earthquakes in Turkey and neighboring Syria ensured a subdued run-up to the election, as Erdogan toured a string of devastated cities, asking for forgiveness and pledging to rebuild. Then his tone shifted, as polls confirmed the race was too near name, or that Erdogan was trailing. In latest weeks, he has savagely attacked Kilicdaroglu and the opposition, accusing them of being backed by “terrorists” or Western powers, in feedback that many noticed as a determined flip for the president, identified for effortlessly outflanking weaker rivals.
On Saturday, Erdogan accused the USA of attempting to intervene within the election. “Biden instructed, ‘We have to deliver down Erdogan,’” he mentioned throughout a speech in Istanbul. “Tomorrow, the poll packing containers will give Biden a solution, as effectively.”
Erdogan, who rose to energy as an Islamist politician, instructions a loyal base of supporters, together with Muslim conservatives whose rights and place in public life he has championed. A number of years in the past, Erdogan struck an alliance with a far-right get together, guaranteeing his political survival. However among the president’s supporters have wavered, delay by his failure to unravel Turkey’s financial woes, together with skyrocketing inflation, and his regular accumulation of energy over nearly all of the levers of the state.
Erdogan ended his marketing campaign Saturday evening with prayers on the Hagia Sophia, the Istanbul landmark that Erdogan transformed in 2020 from a museum right into a mosque, to the delight of his pious supporters.
Kilicdaroglu, a soft-spoken former bureaucrat who lacks Erdogan’s charisma, has delivered his messages of change to Turkey’s public by videos posted on Twitter and different social media platforms to evade the federal government’s stranglehold on the information media. On Thursday, a third-party candidate, Muharrem Ince, withdrew from the election, doubtlessly offering an additional enhance to Kilicdaroglu.
In a decent race, Erdogan’s penchant for political survival above all else — and feedback by a few of his loyalists — has raised questions concerning the equity of the election and whether or not the president will settle for the outcomes. However few in Turkey, the place elections are held virtually sacred, assume he would attempt to cancel a vote, even one which resulted in his defeat.
“This can be a very foolish query,” the president mentioned in a nationally televised interview with journalists Friday. “We got here to energy in Turkey by a democratic manner. We got here to energy with the belief of our individuals. Simply as we got here to energy with the favor of our individuals, that’s, if our nation makes a special choice, we’ll do precisely that, regardless of the necessity of democracy. There’s nothing else to do.”
Regardless of such assurances, there have been accusations of election tampering, together with a declare by Kilicdaroglu on Thursday on Twitter that Russia was behind “montages, conspiracies, deepfake content material and tapes,” he wrote, with out offering proof. Russia has denied the claims.
A statement by Twitter on Saturday that mentioned the social media firm had taken “motion to limit entry to some content material in Turkey” in response to what it mentioned was a “authorized course of” and an effort to “guarantee Twitter stays out there to the individuals of Turkey.” There was no indication Sunday that accounts have been being blocked or censored.
The Turkish authorities has throttled entry to social media websites prior to now, including during the recent earthquakes, based on monitoring teams.
The string of cities in southern Turkey crushed by the earthquakes have been being carefully watched Sunday for indications of voter turnout, in a area the place a whole lot of hundreds of individuals have been displaced. In Antakya, one in all Turkey’s most devastated cities, a 62-year-old contractor returned together with his household to vote Sunday, driving from the coastal Mediterranean metropolis of Mersin, about three hours away, the place that they had discovered short-term shelter.
In Antakya’s Elektrik neighborhood, the contractor, Mehmet, stopped on the website of his former house constructing and commenced looking out what remained of the rubble. He mentioned he had strengthened the muse of the constructing himself. It had withstood the earthquakes however was left uninhabitable after neighboring buildings fell onto it.
Instantly after the earthquakes, the household utilized to remain in a tent or container close by, however Mehmet — who declined to present his final identify for concern of the present political local weather — mentioned nothing got here of it. “For the previous three months, we’ve been ruined, and no person has reached out to us,” he mentioned.
He and his relations — together with his 87-year-old diabetic mom and his spouse, who has a debilitating hormonal dysfunction referred to as Addison’s illness — finally discovered shelter within the residence of a pal in Mersin. However Mehmet described the association as short-term and doesn’t know what comes after. It’s arduous, he mentioned, to “see a future for myself.”
Mehmet referred to as the earthquake reduction effort in Antakya a missed alternative for Erdogan. “If he actually reached out to us, he might have gained the individuals’s hearts right here, however he didn’t,” Mehmet mentioned. “In case you attempt to heal individuals’s wounds, in the event you attain out to them of their time of want, individuals will embrace you. However in the event you deal with individuals like they’re from the ‘different’ aspect, they’ll see you a similar manner, too.”
The household voted for Kilicdaroglu.
Oztaskin reported from Antakya, Turkey.
