Erdogan declares victory in elections

ISTANBUL » Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan declared victory in a pivotal election Sunday, saying voters had “handed him” the presidency.

Speaking early today, Supreme Election Council head Sadi Guven said 97.7 percent of votes had been counted and declared Erdogan the winner, according to the Associated Press.

The election was one of the most consequential votes in years and saw a revitalized opposition unify to challenge the incumbent president, who has ruled Turkey for a decade and a half.

The victor will wield sweeping executive powers under a new presidential system, which curbs the authority of parliament and the judiciary and which critics say entrenches one-man rule.

Erdogan’s ruling party and its nationalist ally also appeared to secure a majority in the legislature, based on unofficial results published by both the state-run news agency and the opposition-linked Election Justice Platform, which was monitoring the count.

Still, Erdogan’s main challenger, Muharrem Ince, and his secular-left People’s Republican Party, or CHP, urged observers to stay at the country’s ballot boxes to ensure votes were counted fairly.

Ince was reported by pro-government media and the pro-opposition platform to have received roughly 30 percent of the vote, with the remaining ballots apparently cast for lesser-known candidates.

The state-run Anadolu Agency said the CHP-led alliance received 34 percent of the parliamentary vote, while Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party, or AKP, lost its majority. But together with its ally, the Nationalist Movement Party, which outperformed at the polls, it will maintain control of the parliament.

— The Associated Press