Turkey's opposition Republican People's Party's (CHP) mayoral candidate Ekrem İmamoğlu won the do-over election in Istanbul, according to unofficial results.
With total of 99.37% of ballots counted, İmamoğlu won 54.03% of the votes, while ruling Justice and Development (AK) Party's candidate Binali Yıldırım received 45.09%.
Having a lead of 777,581 votes, according to unofficial results, İmamoğlu secured over 4.7 million votes, while his rival Yıldırım bagged nearly 4 million votes.
In a victory speech, İmamoğlu thanked Istanbulites for "protecting Turkey's century-old democratic tradition."
"You protected the dignity of Turkey's democracy in front of the whole world," the CHP candidate said.
He said the outcome of the election is not a "victory" but a "new beginning" for the city.
Earlier, Yıldırım congratulated İmamoğlu after preliminary results showed latter leading the race.
"We will try to support him in every work he will do, on behalf of Istanbulites," he added.
- Erdoğan congratulates İmamoğlu
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan congratulated İmamoğlu as unofficial results suggested a convincing win for the CHP candidate.
"The national will has appeared once again today. I congratulate Ekrem İmamoğlu, who has won the election, according to unofficial results," Erdoğan said in a Twitter post.
Meanwhile, Sadi Guven, head of the Supreme Election Council, said the official results of the Istanbul do-over election will be announced soon.
"Around 65% of ballots; 19,910 ballot boxes, have been officially screened in our system," Guven said.
"10,560,963 voters cast their votes in 31,342 ballot boxes including the ones in prisons and portable ballot boxes," he said.
He said the council will issue the certificate of election to the deserving candidate, following completion of the appeal process.
İmamoğlu and Yıldırım vied to run the metropolitan municipality of Turkey's most populous city after a previous vote on March 31 was annulled by the country's top election council last month.
