Turkey's Ruling Party Hopeful of Overturning Istanbul Election

(Bloomberg) -- Binali Yildirim, the ruling AK Party’s candidate for Istanbul mayor, said he was confident his defeat in March 31 elections would be overturned as votes declared invalid are recounted this weekend.

“We believe the result in Istanbul will change,” Yildirim, Turkey’s last prime minister, told reporters in the city on Friday. The opposition CHP’s Ekrem Imamoglu now led by about 18,000 votes, Yildirim said, narrowing from 25,000 in the initial count. More than 300,000 votes were originally invalidated.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s AK Party received its biggest electoral set back in a quarter century at the municipal polls, losing control of Ankara, the capital, and the country’s biggest city and commercial hub Istanbul. The ordered recount there has fueled concerns that the party is attempting to reverse the vote.

“The longer this goes on the worse it looks,” Tim Ash, senior strategist at BlueBay Asset Management LLP in London, said by email. “If the results are overturned in questionable circumstances, that does not look great.”

Invalid votes are being rechecked in many Istanbul districts after the AK Party alleged irregularities, Haberturk website reported Friday. It said that valid votes in the same bags as those ruled illegitimate are also being recounted.

Imamoglu said in a tweet that he was ahead by 18,742 votes after completed recounts in 17 Istanbul districts.

“There are many ballot boxes to be recounted,” Yildirim said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Taylan Bilgic in Istanbul at tbilgic2@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Onur Ant at oant@bloomberg.net, Mark Williams, Jacqueline Mackenzie

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