Recep Tayyip Erdogan re-elected President of Türkiye

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan casts his vote in Istanbul on June 24. Photo: Getty

Sadi Guven, head of Türkiye's Supreme Election Commission, said 97.7% of the votes had been counted and “uncounted votes do not change the result”.

Erdogan declared victory before official results were announced. However, the opposition has responded, claiming that state media and the election commission manipulated the results and insisting it is too early to say for sure.

Erdogan’s victory will give him sweeping new powers as he continues in office. Last year, he narrowly won a referendum to transform the country’s parliamentary system into a powerful executive role for the presidency, in a move critics called a “blatant power grab.”

Erdogan also said the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), and its ally the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), had jointly maintained control of parliament.

The results are a blow to Erdogan's biggest rival - Muharrem Ince and his Republican People's Party (CHP), who had seemed able to force the president into a second round of voting and refused to hand over a parliamentary majority to the AKP-MHP alliance.

“Our country has given me presidential powers,” Erdogan said in a victory speech in Istanbul, noting that his declaration was based on unofficial results.

“I want to congratulate our country once again. This was another test for democracy and we passed the test successfully,” he added.

Candidate Muharrem Ince casts his vote on June 24 in the city of Yalova. Photo: Getty

Some 59 million voters are eligible to cast ballots in presidential and parliamentary elections on June 24. Erdogan said turnout was 90%, an exceptionally high figure for any election.

Earlier, the state-run Anadolu news agency reported that their president won the early election with 52.7% of the vote, with more than 96% of the votes counted. The source also said that the AKP-MHP alliance had more than 53% of the votes in the parliamentary election, with 98% of the votes counted.

However, the opposition CHP claimed that about half of the ballot boxes had not been counted, and called on party monitors to stand next to the ballot boxes and continue monitoring.

A spokesman for Erdogan's AKP party, Mahir Unal, denied the allegations and warned party leaders of “harsh consequences” for any provocation.

Opposition parties will have five days to make any complaints or responses, if any.

An elderly voter rides a wheelchair to a polling station in Istanbul. Photo: Getty

Erdogan has dominated Turkish politics since emerging as prime minister in 2003 and reforming the country. He has implemented policies that have encouraged sustained economic growth and development, challenged Türkiye’s long-standing foundations by introducing Islamic conservatism into public life, and angered its institutions by arresting tens of thousands of people, including many of his critics, after a failed coup in 2016.

Erdogan himself called the election 18 months early, facing battles on multiple fronts: Turkish voters are feeling the effects of soaring inflation, currency devaluation, and high interest rates as the economy weakens, and the usually disjointed opposition is uniting against him for the first time in years. By offering a wider-than-usual field of presidential candidates, the opposition hoped to split the vote enough to leave the front-runner with no more than 50 percent of the total.

Erdogan has won back-to-back elections to become Türkiye's longest-serving leader, but a strong campaign by Mr Ince has fuelled speculation that the president may not win outright.