Voting begins across Turkey in first-ever presidential runoff
May 28, 2023
Ankara [Turkey], May 28 : Turkey is voting to decide the fate of its longest-serving President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the opposition candidate Kemal Kilicdaroglu in Sunday's presidential election, Anadolu Agency reported.
For Sunday's run-off presidential election, a total of 191,885 ballot boxes have been set up for voters in the country.
More than 64.1 million people are registered to vote, including over 1.92 million who already cast their ballots at overseas polling stations.
Overseas voting was held until Wednesday (May 24). As for customs gates, voters can cast their ballots until domestic polling stations close at 5 pm local time (1400GMT) on Sunday.
Millions of voters went to the polls on May 14 to elect the country's president and members of its 600-seat parliament, reported Anadolu Agency, a Turkey-based news agency.
TASS News reported that Erdogan has said that on May 28 Turkish voters will have to make "the most important choice in their lives, to take a decision concerning the future of the country and children."
Meanwhile, his opposition candidate Kilicdaroglu has noted that "Turkish citizens would have to make a choice between two candidates and two world views for the first time ever."
As Turkey will turn 100 on October 29, the Justice and Development Party headed by Erdogan has drafted a development strategy for the country dubbed 'Century of Turkey', which is also referred to as the party's electoral program. The plan is to start its implementation after the election, same as ramp up efforts on adopting a new constitution, which was announced by the Turkish leader earlier.
The opposition also insists on passing a new main law as it seeks to transform the presidential form of ruling in the country into the parliamentary one. However, it will not meet this goal, considering the fact that the ruling alliance won the majority in the newly-convened legislative assembly at the parliamentary vote on May 14, as per the reports in Tass, a Russia-based news agency.
Notably, no presidential candidate managed to secure a first-round victory in Turkey's presidential election on May 14, with the incumbent President receiving 49.4 per cent of the vote and the opposition candidate getting nearly 45 per cent, reported TASS.
