End of voting in Turkish local elections.. Istanbul on a hot plate

Voting in the local elections across Turkey ended at 17:00 local time.

Following the conclusion of voting, the Supreme Electoral Committee immediately began the vote counting process. The announcement of election results is expected as soon as the media ban is lifted by the Supreme Electoral Committee.

Simultaneously, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan urged the Turkish people via his account on the "X" platform to protect the ballot boxes and votes.

Erdogan wrote: "My dear friends and comrades.. At 17:00, voting ended across the country. It's time to protect the ballot boxes and votes."

He added: "Until the final vote is counted and the results announced, I urge all brothers and sisters not to leave their designated ballot boxes and to support the will of the nation until the end."

Istanbul on a hot plate

In this context, Turkish channel (NTV) and Turkish radio stations reported that the partial official vote count showed the current mayor of Istanbul, and the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) candidate, Ekrem Imamoglu, leading in the mayoral election.

The channel reported that Imamoglu received 49.53% after counting 13.21% of the votes. Meanwhile, AK Party candidate Murat Kurum, backed by President Erdogan, received 41.79% of the votes.

The number of registered voters eligible to vote in the local elections is 61,441,882.

Voters cast their votes in 206,845 polling stations, in addition to a thousand mobile polling stations distributed throughout the 81 Turkish provinces.