Mayoral election in Istanbul
The June 2019 Istanbul mayoral election was held on 23 June 2019. It was a repeat of the March 2019 mayoral election, which was annulled by the Supreme Electoral Council (YSK) on 6 May 2019. The original election had resulted in a narrow 0.2% margin of victory for opposition candidate Ekrem İmamoğlu, causing the governing Justice and Development Party (AK Party) to successfully petition for a by-election.
The Nation Alliance (formed of the Republican People's Party (CHP) and the Good Party) fielded their initial candidate Ekrem İmamoğlu, who ran a positive campaign under the slogan "Her Şey Çok Güzel Olacak" (Everything will be fine). The governing People's Alliance (formed by the AK Party and the Nationalist Movement Party) reselected their initially unsuccessful candidate Binali Yıldırım. The non-aligned Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) did not stand their own candidate and announced their support for İmamoğlu. The election featured a televised debate between the two main candidates, for the first time in Turkey since 2002. Campaigning focused highly on rival accusations of misconduct during and after the initial March 2019 election, during which both sides alleged that they had been a victim of the other's antics.
The results showed a substantial swing in favour of İmamoğlu, who multiplied his initial 13,700-vote margin of victory 57-fold to win 54.2% of the vote against Yıldırım's 45.0%. The opposition's victory defied opinion polls, which predicted a much narrower victory, and was a record in the history of Istanbul local elections in terms of both popular vote and percentage share. İmamoğlu also won pluralities in 28 of Istanbul's 39 districts. Yıldırım, on the other hand, lost 11 districts he had won in March and saw a 4% decrease in his previous vote share, conceding defeat soon after indicative results became public. The result was seen as a huge defeat to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who had once said that if his party "lost Istanbul, we would lose Turkey." Commentators viewed the result as a backlash against Erdoğan, the initial annulment of the March vote (which was largely seen as an anti-democratic manoeuvre), economic mismanagement and negative campaigning. It was also seen as a backfire against the government's last-ditch attempt to involve the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK)'s imprisoned leader Abdullah Öcalan in the process, in an attempt to convince HDP voters to boycott the election.
The opposition's landslide was characterised at the time as the "beginning of the end" for Erdoğan, with international commentators calling the re-run a huge government miscalculation that led to a potential İmamoğlu candidacy in the next scheduled presidential election. It was suggested that the scale of the government's defeat could provoke a Cabinet reshuffle and an early general election, though this did not come to pass. İmamoğlu would end up not being chosen as the opposition's presidential candidate in 2023, and Erdoğan would end up being narrowly re-elected, defeating Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu.
31 March 2019 election.
Election results.
After the local elections were held on 31 March 2019, the Chairman of the Supreme Electoral Council (YSK), Sadi Güven, announced that Ekrem İmamoğlu received 4,159,650 votes and that he was ahead of Justice and Development Party's (AK Party) Istanbul mayoral candidate Binali Yıldırım. The Istanbul Provincial Organization of the AKP demanded a re-count of invalid votes and the correction of ballot records on 2 April, which was approved by the Supreme Electoral Council. At the conclusion of the re-counting process on 17 April 2019, it was announced that Ekrem İmamoğlu had completed the election with 4,169,765 votes, 13,729 votes ahead of his rival Binali Yıldırım, who received 4,156,036 votes. On the same day, İmamoğlu began his term by receiving his certificate of election from the Supreme Electoral Council's İstanbul Provincial Electoral Council.
Annulment of the election.
On 6 May 2019, in a 7-to-4 decision, the YSK ruled that the Istanbul mayoral election shall be annulled, and that it shall be repeated on 23 June 2019. This decision was based on the objections raised by the AK Party regarding the fact that despite the law, some balloting committee presidents and members were not public officials. Despite the decision, the President of the YSK Sadi Güven was one of the four members who voted against annulment. He later publicly stated that he was not in favour of renewing the election.
Electoral schedule.
The Supreme Electoral Council determined the electoral schedule based on its decision on 6 May 2019 to annul the original election and repeat it on 23 June 2019:
Electoral conduct.
The Supreme Electoral Council announced that the electoral roll would be exactly the same as the electors in the March 2019. Since the vote was a re-run, voters who turned 18 between 31 March and 23 June 2019 would not be included on the electoral roll. The YSK did, however, remove individuals with mental disabilities from voter lists. This was due to numerous complaints from all parties in the March local elections that mentally impaired individuals unable to exercise free thought were exploited for their vote. As a result, the Istanbul electorate fell from 10,570,939 to 10,570,354 (including deaths and convictions during this time).
Election campaign and party stances.
Candidates.
The nominee of the governing Justice and Development Party (AK Party) was Binali Yıldırım, a former Prime Minister of Turkey and an incumbent Member of the Grand National Assembly. As part of the People's Alliance, the AK Party's candidate had the support of the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP). Ekrem İmamoğlu was the candidate of the Republican People's Party (CHP), and was supported by the CHP-allied Good Party, which is a part of the Nation Alliance.
After the annulment of the 31 March elections, the Democratic Left Party (DSP) candidate Muammer Aydın, the Independent Turkey Party (BTP) candidate Selim Kotil, the Democratic Party candidate Ersan Gökgöz, the Turkish Communist Party candidate Zehra Güner Karaoğlu, the Worker's Movement Party-supported independent candidate Özge Akman, the Turkish Communist Movement-supported independent candidate Aysel Tekerek, and the independent candidate Hazer Oruç Kaya all announced that they would not stand in the upcoming election.
The Felicity Party (Saadet Party) candidate Necdet Gökçınar, the Patriotic Party (Vatan Party) candidate Mustafa İlker Yücel, and the independent candidates Doğan Duman and Muhammet Ali Canca, conversely announced that they would participate in the Istanbul mayoral election that would be repeated on 23 June 2019.
On 27 May 2019, the finalized candidate list for the 23 June 2019 election was announced. In the list announced by the Istanbul Provincial Electoral Council, there are 17 independent candidates aside from the partied candidates Ekrem İmamoğlu, Binali Yıldırım, Necdet Gökçınar, and Mustafa İlker Yücel.
Justice and Development Party.
In the articles published on 9 May 2019 regarding the AK Party's strategy, it was said that the AK Party would go door-to-door to convince undecided voters and those who did not vote on 31 March, that the AK Party would soften its rhetoric, that projects regarding Istanbul and its districts would be emphasized, and that the AK Party would participate in joint rallies with the MHP. Aside from these efforts, president and AK Party leader Recep Tayyip Erdoğan would join iftar dinners throughout Ramadan, make house visits to voters, and hold rallies in each of the 39 districts of Istanbul. An election coordination center was created under the scope of these strategies, and Mehmet Özhaseki, AK Party's candidate for Ankara mayor on 31 March 2019 was chosen to lead this operation.
As part of their election campaign, AK Party's goals were:
Campaign towards resentful AK Party voters.
A different rhetoric was used towards the estimated 400,000 to 700,000 AK Party voters who did not vote for Binali Yıldırım on 31 March as a reaction against the party's policies. In this context, the statements by government spokesperson Mahir Ünal's and AK Party group deputy chairman Numan Kurtulmuş's statements drew special attention.
Campaign towards Kurdish voters.
During the campaign for the election on 31 March, the AK Party along with its partner MHP emphasized the "survival problem" in its rhetoric. Afterwards, the AK Party determined that many conservative Kurds who had previously voted for the AK Party had not voted on 31 March, due to the fact that the rhetoric associating Kurds with terrorism during the campaign had been highly successful. Accordingly, the AK Party decided to proceed with a separate effort for the roughly 230,000 conservative Kurds who did not vote on 31 March. AK Party decided to campaign by messaging that they would "fix their mistakes" to people such as opinion leaders, business people, NGOs in the southeastern provinces as well as in Istanbul. Through this, the AK Party planned to communicate directly with the Kurdish voters. On the other hand, the AK Party appealed to the MHP, which supports Binali Yıldırım in the election, not to campaign in Istanbul.
On 6 May 2019, the lawyers of imprisoned PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan were allowed to visit Öcalan in an unprecedented move. This was followed by the lifting of the ban on the visitation of Öcalan by Justice Minister Abdülhamit Gül. These actions, combined with a shift in rhetoric on Öcalan by the Anadolu Agency from pre-31 March "head terrorist" to simply "İmralı", the referral of Öcalan as "estimable Öcalan" by Presidential Security and Foreign Policy Council member Burhanettin Duran, as well as Öcalan's request for an end to the hunger strikes started for the betterment of his imprisonment conditions on 26 May all caused speculation of cooperation between the AK Party and Öcalan. On the other hand, speculation was also made that the purpose of the meetings with Öcalan was to cause a drop in İmamoğlu's votes by either having the HDP name a candidate for mayor, or by having the HDP boycott the election. Conversely, MHP leader Bahçeli said, in regards to Öcalan's visitation by his lawyers, that "If you ask me, he should meet with his lawyer". On 9 May, İmam Taşçıer offered Kurdish support for the AK Party candidate in exchange of the release of the Kurds who were imprisoned unjustly, recognizing the legitimate Kurdish rights in Turkey and the establishment of good relations with the Syrian Kurds, contrary, Kurds might throw their support behind the CHP.
Binali Yıldırım visited Diyarbakır on 6 June in order to gain the support of Kurdish voters in Istanbul. There, he welcomed those who came to listen to him using Kurdish words, claimed that there were "members of parliament from Kurdistan in the inaugural Grand National Assembly of Turkey, and pronounced the name of the PKK differently than the way that it is commonly pronounced, all of which drew a reaction. These actions by Yıldırım in Diyarbakır were criticised by Good Party leader Meral Akşener as "first calling Kurds terrorists, and then going to Diyarbakır and crying to get their votes in Istanbul", and by MHP leader Devlet Bahçeli as "there is no Kurdistan or Lazistan in Turkey. Neither will there be in the future. If there are who wish that there would be, they will always find the Nationalist-Idealist movement". Bahçeli's statement was ignored by media organizations close to the AK Party. Co-leader of the HDP Sezai Temelli also criticized the hypocrisy of Yıldırım's actions.
On 22 June 2019, the recently inaugurated President of the Kurdistan Region Nechirvan Barzani visited Istanbul and met with Turkish President Tayyip Erdoğan, who described Barzani as his "special guest". It was Barzani's first official foreign visit as the President of the KRI. The goal of the visit has been interpreted by several media outlets, including Voice of America, as to gain Kurdish support for the ruling Justice and Development Party's candidate Binali Yıldırım in the upcoming 23 June 2019 Istanbul mayoral election.
"Because they stole" statement.
After the annulment of the 31 March elections, Binali Yıldırım gave the response "very simple, because they stole" to a citizen who asked about the annulment. Following this, the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) began to regularly allege that the Republican People's Party (CHP) had stolen votes. As part of this, President Erdoğan claimed that there existed footage proving that the CHP had committed vote theft, but this footage never surfaced. However, despite this, Erdoğan continued to raise this allegation.
On the other hand, in regards to the accusation that the CHP stole votes, Yıldırım alleged that balloting council presidents had not given the relevant ballots to those that they identified as AK Party voters in the 31 March elections. Meanwhile, Minister of the Interior Süleyman Soylu claimed that the votes were stolen