Turkey’s President Erdogan has declared himself the winner of the national election, surviving the most serious challenge yet to his political dominance and tightening his grip on the nation he has now ruled for 15 years.
But the opposition has cried foul, claiming that state media and the election commission manipulated the results and saying it was too early to be sure of the outcome.
The outcome is being closely watched not just in Turkey but in Western and regional capitals and especially in Greece, as tensions with Erdogan and his political party’s provocations towards Greece have been heightened over the last few months.
If Erdogan’s victory is officially confirmed, reports claim he will gain sweeping new powers when he resumes office. He narrowly won a referendum last year to transform the country’s parliamentary system to a powerful executive presidency, and Erdogan also said his ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and its allied Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) had together retained their control of parliament.
The results were a blow to Erdogan’s closest rival, Muharrem Ince and his Republican People’s Party (CHP), who had seemed on the verge of forcing the President into a damaging runoff and denying the AKP-MHP alliance a parliamentary majority.
“Our nation has given me the mandate for the presidency,” Erdogan said in a victory speech, noting his declaration was based on unofficial results.
“I would like to congratulate our nation once again. This has been another test of democracy and we have passed this test successfully.”
Erdogan said the participation rate was 90%, an extraordinarily high number for any election.
State news agency Anadolu reported that the President had sailed through the snap vote at 52.7%, with more than 96% of the ballots counted. It also said the AKP-MHP coalition had more than 53% of the parliamentary vote, with over 98% of the votes counted.
But the opposition CHP said that around half the ballot boxes had not yet been counted, and called on party monitors to stay by the ballot boxes and keep watching.
A spokesman for Erodgan’s AKP, Mahir Unal, dismissed the accusations and warned party leaders of “harsh outcomes” to any provocations.
