President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s ruling party suffered a resounding defeat in Turkey’s local polls, leaving the political strongman facing his most severe electoral setback since his rise to power two decades ago.
The opposition was on course to score decisive mayoral victories against Erdoğan’s Justice and Development party (AKP) in Istanbul, Ankara, Izmir, Bursa and Antalya, Turkey’s five biggest cities, according to initial results on Sunday’s race published by the Anadolu state news agency. About 98 per cent of ballot boxes had been counted by Monday morning.
Opposition mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu’s strong performance for the Republican People’s party (CHP) in Istanbul marked a particularly painful blow to Erdoğan, who had campaigned vigorously for the AKP candidate in the hopes of vanquishing his most credible rival.
“Istanbul has delivered its message,” İmamoğlu told a large crowd of supporters who gathered in the centre of the city on Monday morning. “The era of one person’s tutelage is over.”
The country’s largest city exploded with excitement, with honking car horns, Turkish flags being waved, colourful flares and crowds bursting into song and dance.
The AKP was also set to sustain losses in several of its strongholds across Turkey’s heartland as voters rebelled against years of blistering inflation, which has sent the price of everything from groceries to vehicles soaring and eroded Turks’ savings.
A conciliatory Erdoğan told his supporters in the capital Ankara that with the election over, the government could now focus on fixing the economy. He promised his efforts to rein in inflation would pay off this year and that he would now prioritise foreign policy, especially curbing Kurdish aspirations for self-rule across the border in Syria.
“We unfortunately could not get the result that we wanted, that we hoped for, in the local elections,” he said. “Under no circumstances will we disrespect our people’s decision . . . That this election chapter, which has tired our nation, our people and our economy for the last year, is closed as of today is in itself a victory.”
But many saw the vote for thousands of local administrators as a referendum on Erdoğan’s authoritarian style of rule, which has included interventions in monetary policy, limits on free speech and political influence in the judiciary.
“It was a ‘no’ vote to Erdoğan especially in Istanbul and a lot of other places as well,” said Selim Koru, an analyst at the Ankara-based Tepav think-tank.
The loss marks a stark turnaround from the presidential election of May last year, in which Erdoğan fought off a six-party opposition alliance trying to unseat him. It also bolsters İmamoğlu’s standing as the only politician in Turkey who has repeatedly been able to take on Erdoğan, Turkey’s most important leader since Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, who founded the republic a century ago.
Aslı Aydıntaşbaş, a fellow at the Washington-based Brookings Institution, said Erdoğan “can no longer count on an opposition that is in disarray”.
İmamoğlu, 52, was on course to beat AKP candidate Murat Kurum by 11 percentage points in the Istanbul race, taking 51 per cent of the vote, according to Anadolu. That marks the highest margin of victory for an Istanbul mayor in four decades.
Erdoğan, 70, had deployed a barrage of resources to the city, holding rallies and dispatching top ministers to campaign for Kurum, as state-aligned media showered the former urbanisation minister with coverage.
İmamoğlu’s win echoed the municipal race in 2019, when he took control of Istanbul in a highly charged campaign in which Erdoğan’s party forced — and then lost — a repeat of the vote.
The returns were more dramatic in Ankara, where incumbent Mansur Yavaş declared victory after securing 60 per cent of the vote, far ahead of AKP opponent Turgut Altınok, who took 32 per cent.
“Turkey’s main opposition party managed to defeat the ruling alliance, delivering the biggest election defeat of Erdoğan’s career,” said Berk Esen, a professor at Istanbul’s Sabancı university, who added that it was the CHP’s best showing since a general election in 1977.
Beyond the country’s biggest cities, the AKP faced the loss of provinces it has dominated for the past decade or longer, mostly in western Turkey. The opposition CHP was also set to wrest control of the southern city of Adıyaman, one of the areas hardest hit in the 2023 earthquake, and Kilis, a conservative province that borders Syria.
In the predominantly Kurdish south-east, the Peoples’ Equality and Democracy party was set to win 10 provincial capitals, compared with eight in 2019. The party has faced a long-running crackdown by Erdoğan that has included the jailing of several of its mayors and its former chair, Selahattin Demirtaş.
The Islamist New Welfare party was on track to capture the religiously conservative cities of Şanlıurfa and Yozgat. The party had supported Erdoğan in last year’s general election but broke with the AKP in this vote over trade with Israel and economic policies.
“It’s enough AKP. We are tired of the AKP because of the economic situation. Everything is so expensive,” said 59-year-old Şanlıurfa resident Ramazan Çimen, who has typically voted for the AKP in the past but said he was backing New Welfare. “We need a change in this country.”
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