Turkish President Erdoğan's ruling party AKP appealed to the Supreme Election Council (YSK) and requested a new recount of all votes cast in 31 districts in İstanbul. AKP also requested cancellation of the election in Istanbul's Büyükçekmece district.
The election council announced that the AKP's request regarding 31 districts was rejected after a six-hour meeting yesterday, April 8.
AKP's representative to the YSK, Recep Özel, announced the decision and further stated that the YSK has decided a recount for the votes in 51 ballot boxes in different districts in İstanbul.
After the YSK decision, AKP deputy chair responsible for the elections, Ali İhsan Yavuz, made a statement.
"We do not understand why the request is rejected by the YSK although everything is so clear. We will try the legal ways to the fullest. There is information that will influence the outcome of the election. The list of voters could not change, of course, but there is organized crime here," he said.
Referring to the YSK decision to recount the votes in 51 ballot boxes, Yavuz stated that "this is an interesting decision. These 51 boxes we addressed were to prove that there had been irregularities. They were just examples".
AKP's mayoral candidate of Istanbul, Binali Yıldırım, was behind his rival from the opposition party, Ekrem İmamoğlu, according to the first results. Yavuz had said the gap narrowed to 16,442 as of April 7, adding that his party would demand from the YSK a total recount in all 39 districts of Istanbul.
Last week, YSK had ordered a full recount in three of Istanbul‘s 39 districts and a recount of just invalid ballots in 15 districts after an appeal from Erdoğan’s AKP. On Thursday, the board decided to order a full recount in those 15 districts as well.
