President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan won most of the votes in Türkiye's southern region devastated by the Feb. 6 twin earthquakes, according to initial results Sunday, as he claimed victory in the presidential runoff that will extend his rule into a third decade.
The powerful quakes killed over 50,000 people, toppling hundreds of thousands of buildings and severely damaging the infrastructure across 11 provinces from Adana near the Mediterranean coast to Diyarbakir in the southeast.
Preliminary results put Erdoğan ahead in nine of 11 provinces in the quake zone, including Adıyaman, Gaziantep, Kahramanmaraş, Kilis, Malatya, Osmaniye, Şanlıurfa, Elazığ and Hatay.
His rival Kemal Kılıçadorğlu, the leader of Türkiye's main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) and the six-party Nation Alliance, was ahead in Adana and Diyarbakır.
Erdoğan's Justice and Development Party (AK Party) emerged at the top in 10 of the affected provinces, helping it secure, along with its allies, a parliamentary majority in the May 14 vote.
The ruling party's strong showing, defying initial expectations that the quakes would hurt its support, was also driven by doubts about the opposition's ability to meet voters' expectations.
Erdoğan fell just short of victory in the first round of the presidential vote, scoring 49.5% of the vote. Kılıçadorğlu received 44.9%.
Erdoğan came out ahead in eight of the affected provinces.
In his first remarks since the polls closed, he spoke to supporters on a campaign bus outside his home in Istanbul, thanking the citizens in the quake-stricken provinces.
"They went to vote in containers, tent cities and cast their votes with great dignity," the president said.
Erdoğan had centered his reelection campaign on rebuilding areas devastated by the deadliest disaster in the country’s modern history.
He has promised to spend whatever is necessary to reconstruct the region. At each ground-breaking ceremony he attended, he pointed to past projects as proof that only his government could rebuild lives after the disaster.
The tremors destroyed or damaged more than 300,000 buildings. Hundreds of thousands of residents are sheltering in temporary accommodation like tents.
Erdoğan has promised to build 319,000 homes within the year.
"As I said, I hope we will solve the permanent housing within a year," he told supporters Sunday evening.
The damage caused by the earthquakes is estimated to be over $100 billion (TL 2 trillion), according to the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
The construction process of more than 100,000 residential buildings and village homes has already started. Erdoğan has said the government will not leave the earthquake region until the construction of a total of 650,000 homes is completed.
