After Istanbul loss, Erdogan vows not to ignore the message

25 June 2019, 2:52 pm

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In his first public appearance since a crushing defeat in a rerun election for mayor of Istanbul, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan vows to draw lessons from “the messages given by the people.”

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan addresses his ruling party MPs, in Ankara, Turkey, June 25, 2019, two days after Ekrem Imamoglu, the candidate of the secular opposition Republican People’s Party, won the election for mayor of Istanbul. (AP Photo/Burhan Ozbilici)

Addressing legislators from his ruling party, Erdogan again congratulates opposition candidate Ekrem Imamoglu who garnered 54.21% of the vote in Istanbul on Sunday.

It was Erdogan’s first electoral defeat and broke his ruling party’s decades-old grip on Turkey’s most important city.

Erdogan says: “We don’t have the luxury of turning a deaf ear and ignoring the messages given by the people.”

He says his ruling party — which is scheduled to meet later today — will determine “failings, disunity and errors” and look for ways to fix them.

— AP