Erdogan leads in tight race for Turkey’s presidency

Turkey’s veteran leader Recep Tayyip Erdoğan led a hotly contested election on Monday to extend his rule into a third decade, registering an expected run-off for the presidency with momentum in his favor.

After a hard-fought campaign that raised hopes of an opposition breakthrough, Erdoğan won 49.3 percent of the vote in the presidential race, more than 45 percent for his main rival Kemal Kilikdaroglu, according to preliminary results from state media.

With no candidate gaining more than 50 percent, as it stands, that will send Erdoğan and Kilikdaroglu to a second round of voting on May 28. The coalition appeared to be on track to win an outright majority in Turkey’s parliamentary election, consolidating its position in any run-off.

Erdogan’s performance reversed opinion polls, giving Kılıçdaroğlu a substantial lead in the final days of a hard-fought campaign. The 74-year-old opposition leader had forged a broad coalition of centrist, nationalist and conservative parties and drawn support from outside Turkey’s main Kurdish bloc against what he calls Erdoğan’s “one-man rule”.

“Erdogan massively exceeded expectations (and) Kılıçdaroğlu disappointed. , , The advantage appears to be with Erdogan in the second round. “He has momentum, and he will take advantage of the divisions that now appear to be in opposition,” Timothy Ash, an emerging markets strategist at Bluebay Asset Management, said in a research note.

Ash wrote, “Markets will be nervous between the first and second rounds, as Erdogan’s economic policies don’t add up.”

A painful economic crisis triggered by Erdogan’s unorthodox management, in which he has clamped down on interest rates despite inflation at more than 40 percent, has eroded Turks’ savings and driven away foreign investors.

The pressing cost of living, a devastating earthquake that killed more than 50,000 people in February and discontent with Erdoğan’s authoritarian ruling style have solidified an opposition that believes Turkey’s longest-serving leader This is your best chance to regain control of it.

But Erdoğan again mobilized his support base with a focus on wage issues, including the opposition’s tacit collaboration with a pro-Kurdish party he accuses of terrorism, as well as generous pay raises and other gifts. Is.

Erdogan stopped short of declaring victory overnight in a speech from the balcony of his Justice and Development Party (AKP) headquarters, a traditional venue he has used to celebrate his party’s dozen or so previous victories.

But the president looked confident, singing a pop tune to thousands of flag-waving supporters and declaring: “We’re already ahead of our nearest competitor (and) hope to see that with the official results.” The figure will go up.”

Simultaneous parliamentary elections gave Erdogan’s right-wing coalition a comfortable majority, which should help him maintain his tight grip on the economy and other aspects of Turkish life if he wins the run-off.

Kılıçdaroğlu, whose campaign slogan was to “get it over with in the first round”, nevertheless struck a defiant tone early Monday, saying: “We will definitely win the second round . . . and bring democracy.

A third party candidate, the ultranationalist Sinan Ogan, received 5.2 percent and was dropped from the race. Oğan said that he was open to talks with both Erdoğan and Kılıçdaroğlu to distribute their voters in the second round. But he said any deal would need to sideline the main pro-Kurdish movement, which won seats in parliament as the Green Left party – a constituency Kılıçdaroğlu needs for any second challenger to Erdoğan.

Kılıçdaroğlu’s allies made repeated complaints on Sunday night about the reporting of vote counts, claiming that state media was attempting to “deceive” the public by flattering Erdoğan’s position. But the opposition, which initially claimed it was well ahead of Erdoğan, eased its objections as vote counting progressed.

Turkey’s veteran leader Recep Tayyip Erdoğan led a hotly contested election on Monday to extend his rule into a third decade, registering an expected run-off for the presidency with momentum in his favor.

After a hard-fought campaign that raised hopes of an opposition breakthrough, Erdoğan won 49.3 percent of the vote in the presidential race, more than 45 percent for his main rival Kemal Kilikdaroglu, according to preliminary results from state media.

With no candidate gaining more than 50 percent, as it stands, that will send Erdoğan and Kilikdaroglu to a second round of voting on May 28. The coalition appeared to be on track to win an outright majority in Turkey’s parliamentary election, consolidating its position in any run-off.

Erdogan’s performance reversed opinion polls, giving Kılıçdaroğlu a substantial lead in the final days of a hard-fought campaign. The 74-year-old opposition leader had forged a broad coalition of centrist, nationalist and conservative parties and drawn support from outside Turkey’s main Kurdish bloc against what he calls Erdoğan’s “one-man rule”.

“Erdogan massively exceeded expectations (and) Kılıçdaroğlu disappointed. , , The advantage appears to be with Erdogan in the second round. “He has momentum, and he will take advantage of the divisions that now appear to be in opposition,” Timothy Ash, an emerging markets strategist at Bluebay Asset Management, said in a research note.

Ash wrote, “Markets will be nervous between the first and second rounds, as Erdogan’s economic policies don’t add up.”

A painful economic crisis triggered by Erdogan’s unorthodox management, in which he has clamped down on interest rates despite inflation at more than 40 percent, has eroded Turks’ savings and driven away foreign investors.

The pressing cost of living, a devastating earthquake that killed more than 50,000 people in February and discontent with Erdoğan’s authoritarian ruling style have solidified an opposition that believes Turkey’s longest-serving leader This is your best chance to regain control of it.

But Erdoğan again mobilized his support base with a focus on wage issues, including the opposition’s tacit collaboration with a pro-Kurdish party he accuses of terrorism, as well as generous pay raises and other gifts. Is.

Erdogan stopped short of declaring victory overnight in a speech from the balcony of his Justice and Development Party (AKP) headquarters, a traditional venue he has used to celebrate his party’s dozen or so previous victories.

But the president looked confident, singing a pop tune to thousands of flag-waving supporters and declaring: “We’re already ahead of our nearest competitor (and) hope to see that with the official results.” The figure will go up.”

Simultaneous parliamentary elections gave Erdogan’s right-wing coalition a comfortable majority, which should help him maintain his tight grip on the economy and other aspects of Turkish life if he wins the run-off.

Kılıçdaroğlu, whose campaign slogan was to “get it over with in the first round”, nevertheless struck a defiant tone early Monday, saying: “We will definitely win the second round . . . and bring democracy.

A third party candidate, the ultranationalist Sinan Ogan, received 5.2 percent and was dropped from the race. Oğan said that he was open to talks with both Erdoğan and Kılıçdaroğlu to distribute their voters in the second round. But he said any deal would need to sideline the main pro-Kurdish movement, which won seats in parliament as the Green Left party – a constituency Kılıçdaroğlu needs for any second challenger to Erdoğan.

Kılıçdaroğlu’s allies made repeated complaints on Sunday night about the reporting of vote counts, claiming that state media was attempting to “deceive” the public by flattering Erdoğan’s position. But the opposition, which initially claimed it was well ahead of Erdoğan, eased its objections as vote counting progressed.