Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's ruling AKP party appears set to suffer a nationwide setback against the main opposition CHP, preliminary unofficial results showed on Sunday.
Erdoğan's AKP is headed for defeat in all top five urban centres, including the largest metropolis Istanbul and capital Ankara, unofficial results from state news agency Anadolu showed.
In Istanbul, incumbent mayor Ekrem Imamoğlu from secular CHP secured around 50% of votes, after almost half of the votes were counted.
His rival Murat Kurum from Erdoğan's Islamic conservative AKP received 41.2% of the vote, according to Anadolu.
Preliminary results indicated a nationwide voter shift away from the AKP compared to the 2019 mayoral elections.
Initial official results are expected later this evening.
