2019 Turkish local elections

The Turkish local elections of 2019 were held on Sunday 31 March 2019 throughout the 81 provinces of Turkey. A total of 30 metropolitan and 1,351 district municipal mayors, alongside 1,251 provincial and 20,500 municipal councillors were elected, in addition to numerous local non-partisan positions such as neighbourhood wardens (muhtars) and elderly people's councils.

The governing Justice and Development Party (AK Party) and the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) contested the elections in many provinces under a joint People's Alliance. Likewise, the Republican People's Party (CHP) and the İYİ Party entered some of the races under the Nation Alliance banner. The Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) did not openly announce support for either alliance, but did not field candidates in some areas to improve chances of opposition candidates. The strategic voting and the refraining from fielding candidates by the HDP in contested areas like Ankara, and Istanbul allowed the opposition parties to gain a majority in these cities, through cooperation.

Campaigning was described as distinctly negative and divisive, with the opposition criticizing the government for Turkey's economic downturn, misuse of public funds and corruption. In response, the government alleged that the opposition parties were acting in the interests of 'foreign powers and terrorists'. Particular controversy surrounded the AK Party's allegations of financial fraud against the opposition's Ankara mayoral candidate Mansur Yavaş, which later turned out to have been made by an unverifiable source. The use of video footage of the Christchurch terrorist attack by AK Party leader and President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan during his election rallies additionally received international condemnation and caused diplomatic relations between Turkey and New Zealand to sour. Five people were killed and two were injured during political violence on election day, in two separate incidents in Gaziantep and Malatya. The election was criticized by observers due to excessive media bias in favour of the governing People's Alliance.

The members of the Nation Alliance were initially beset with issues concerning candidate selection and inner-party divisions, stemming from their general election loss in June 2018. However, both the CHP and the İYİ Party collectively managed to outperform expectations, securing 'shock' victories in Turkey's major metropolitan areas. These included winning control of both Ankara and Istanbul, Turkey's capital and largest city respectively. The CHP also held control of İzmir, Turkey's third largest city, and now governs 5 of Turkey's 6 largest population centres (the only exception being Bursa, where the governing coalition narrowly won). The Communist Party won control of a provincial capital, namely Tunceli, for the first time. In provinces where the AK Party and MHP contested as separate parties, there was a substantial swing from AK Party candidates to the MHP. Nevertheless, AK Party leader and President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan claimed victory, announcing that the People's Alliance had secured over 50% of the vote and thus maintained support from the majority of the electorate (final results actually gave the People's Alliance just under 50%, while the Nation Alliance won 38%).

The election was beset by a number of controversies, including an unexplained results blackout on election night just when the opposition were on the verge of victory in Istanbul. The Electoral Board also invalidated the successful election of by the approved candidates from the pro-Kurdish HDP and following awarded the mayorships to the AK Party. The Istanbul mayoral election, where CHP candidate Ekrem İmamoğlu defeated AK Party candidate and former Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım by just under 14,000 votes (0.17%), remained disputed for two weeks after the vote. This result was made public after a blackout, by which point the CHP candidate was up by more than 24,000 votes. Numerous recounts, electoral complaints, legal disputes, alleged corruption, accusations of terrorist involvement and police operations took place after the election, initiated mainly by the AK Party. İmamoğlu was sworn in as mayor, though a new election was held on 23 June. The result was an unexpected landslide victory for İmamoğlu, who defeated Yıldırım by over nine points, 54.2% to 45%.