Erdogan wins Turkey's election

Leader of Turkey’s secular and center-left Republican People’s Party (CHP), Kemal Kilicdaroglu (pronounced Ke-lich-dar-ou-loo) is widely seen as everything President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is not.

A lawmaker representing the CHP since 2002 – the same year that saw Erdogan’s AK Party rise to power – Kilicdaroglu, 74, climbed up the political ladder to become his party’s seventh chairman in 2010.

Born in the eastern, Kurdish-majority province of Tunceli, the party leader ran in Turkey’s 2011 general election but lost, coming second to Erdogan and his AK Party.

Kilicdaroglu represents the party formed 100 years ago by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the founding father of modern Turkey and a die-hard secularist. He stands in stark contrast to Erdogan’s Islamist-rooted party and its conservative base.

Despite his secular leanings, however, the opposition candidate and his alliance have vowed to represent all factions of Turkish society, which analysts say was demonstrated in his diverse coalition.

Sometimes referred to as “Ghandhi Kemal” for both his physical resemblance to India’s Mahatma Ghandhi as well as his humble decorum, Kilicdaroglu is seen as Erdogan’s polar opposite, analysts say.

While both Kilicdaroglu and Erdogan hail from humble socio-economic backgrounds, “they evolved to be completely different creatures,” says Murat Somer, a political science professor at Koc University in Istanbul.

Symbolically, “Erdogan is the shopkeeper, Kilicdaroglu is the bureaucrat,” said Somer, referring to Erdogan’s businessman-like approach, as opposed to that of Kilicdaroglu, who Somer says is more committed to procedure.

“Kilicdaroglu will try to fight corruption and also bring past corruptions to justice,” he said.

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Erdogan's 'polar opposite' wants to replace him as president of Turkey | CNN

Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s rise to power was ushered in by the contentious political aftermath of the 1999 Izmit earthquake. So when another devastating quake laid waste to large swathes of southeast Turkey earlier this year, many observers expected the president’s two-decade rule to end with a full circle.

Instead, Erdogan appears to have defied the odds.

The first round of Turkey’s presidential and parliamentary voting on May 14 made him the frontrunner in the race that pollsters predicted could unseat him.

This week, the third-place presidential candidate Sinan Ogan, publicly endorsed Erdogan, further boosting his chances against Kilicdaroglu in the runoff election.

“It will be the people who will be the kingmakers, and when the people decide, I believe they will stand with those who have successfully served the Turkish nation for the last 21 years,” Erdogan told CNN’s Becky Anderson in an exclusive interview last week.

During that interview, the president tried to burnish his credentials, skirting over the country’s years-long financial crisis and his government’s shortcomings in rescue operations after the catastrophic February earthquake.

He dismissed the 74-year-old Kilicdaroglu as a political amateur. The two rivals have fashioned their campaigns as an array of contrasts. While Erdogan aimed to showcase his political prowess and repeatedly touted Turkey’s rapidly growing defense industry, Kilicdaroglu presented himself as the quintessential technocrat: softspoken, level-headed and conciliatory.

Six right- and left-wing opposition groups united behind Kilicdaroglu in an unprecedented bid to unseat the sitting president, and cast a wide net over Turkish voters. They hoped to seize on public disgruntlement over a floundering economy and the aftermath of the quake. Erdogan, on the other hand, focused on reinvigorating his conservative strongholds.

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A catastrophic quake could have ended Erdogan's rule. He's now poised to win the election | CNN

Hello and welcome to our live coverage of a hugely significant election in Turkey.

Millions of voters across the country are casting their ballots in a runoff on Sunday after longtime leader President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was forced into a second round against his chief opposition rival, Kemal Kilicdaroglu.

The turnout in the first round was extraordinarily high in the presidential and parliamentary elections on May 14, at 88.92% of the 64 million eligible voters in Turkey and overseas, according to the election council.

Neither candidate achieved the required 50% to take the presidency outright in the first round, but Erdogan did secure a comfortable lead over Kilicdaroglu. The president won 49.5% of votes over Kilicdaroglu's 44.9%.

That lead, and his endorsement by ultranationalist candidate Sinan Ogan, who came in third in the first round, position Erdogan as favorite to win a third five-year term in office.

Polls close at 5 p.m. local time and results are expected a few hours after that. We will bring you the results as they happen.