Presidential election in Turkey: Erdogan claims victory, after two decades in power

2023-05-28 19:33:57

Polling stations in Turkey closed their doors on Sunday at 5 p.m. (4 p.m. in Paris) after the second round of a presidential election for which the outgoing president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, 69 ans, left as a favorite after two decades in power, facing his rival social-democrat Kemal Kilicdaroglu.

According to the official Anadolu agency, after counting 95% of the ballots, the head of state in power for twenty years is the winner with nearly 52.3% of the votes cast against 47.7% for his rival. Even the Anka agency, which had so far given advance to Kemal Kiliçdaroglu, estimates that Recep Tayyip Erdogan has passed above the 50% mark, with 51.52%, according to provisional results.

Despite a strong desire for change from part of the electorate, weary of the economic crisis, restrictions on freedoms and hyper-presidentialization, on May 14, Erdogan had made the polls give the lie largely losing and came first, with 49.5% of the vote, ahead of Kemal Kiliçdaroglu and his 44.9% of votes collected.

But for the first time this year, he had to go through a second round to put his position back on the line.

“No country in the world has participation rates of 90%, Turkey has almost reached them. I ask my fellow citizens to come and vote without weakening,” he argued as 60 million voters were called to the polls. In the first round, participation had reached 87%.

Thanking those who had worked in the polling stations since “the early hours of the morning”, the president invited on Twitter his “brothers to watch over the ballot boxes until the results are final. Now is the time to protect the will of our nation above our heads until the last moment! »

I would like to thank each of my colleagues who have been devotedly working at the ballot boxes since the early hours of the morning.

I invite all my brothers to take care of the ballot boxes until the results are final.

Now is the time to protect the will of our nation over our heads until the last moment!

— Recep Tayyip Erdogan (@RTErdogan) May 28, 2023

The date of this second round comes ten years to the day after the start of the large demonstrations of “Gezi” which had spread throughout the country and had been severely suppressed.

But on Sunday, the Erdogan camp showed its confidence in preparing the speech of the outgoing president, in the evening, from the presidential palace in Ankara.