Turkey set for return to single party rule

Turkey’s prime minister Ahmet Davutoglu has declared victory for his ruling party after preliminary election results showed it restoring its majority in parliament.

State-run TRT television reported that with more than 95% of the votes counted, the ruling Justice and Development Party, or AKP, has won just above 49%, which would comfortably restore its ruling majority.

Davutoglu said: “Today is the day of victory of democracy and the people.”

The results suggest that AKP’s gamble to hold new elections has paid off.

Graphic shows estimated seats in the new parliament.

Supporters at the party’s Ankara and Istanbul headquarters were already waving flags in celebrations.

The vote is a rerun of a June election in which AKP surprisingly lost its one-party rule due to a strong showing by a Kurdish party.

The result is a major boost for President Tayyip Erdogan but is likely to sharpen deep social divisions.

Security forces fired tear gas at stone-throwing protesters in the mainly Kurdish south-eastern city of Diyarbakir as results filtered in, with support for the pro-Kurdish opposition falling perilously near the 10% threshold to enter parliament.

Erdogan had presented yesterday’s polls as a chance to restore stability at a time of tension over Kurdish insurrection and after two bombings, attributed to IS, while critics fear a drift to authoritarianism under the president.

The AKP’s 49.5% was higher than many party officials had expected. The main opposition CHP was at 25.2% .

Senior AKP officials told Reuters they expected to be able to form a single-party government again, with one of them forecasting a final share of around 45% to 46% of the vote. “This is a success exceeding our expectations,” one of the officials said, acknowledging the scale of the victory was a surprise.

Since June’s poll, a ceasefire with Kurdish militants has collapsed, the war in neighbouring Syria has worsened and Turkey — a NATO member state — has been buffeted by two IS-linked suicide bomb attacks that killed more than 130 people

Investors and Western allies hoped the vote would help restore stability and confidence in the €725bn economy, allowing Ankara to play a more effective role in stemming a flood of refugees from neighbouring wars via Turkey into Europe and helping in the battle against IS militants.

But in strengthening Erdogan, whose crackdowns on media freedoms and tightening grip on the judiciary have alarmed European leaders, the outcome is likely to mean relations with the West will remain strained.

Reuters