People hold a ballot paper during the second round of the Turkish presidential election in Istanbul, May 28, 2023. (Credit: AFP/YASIN AKGUL)
BEIRUT — The majority of Turkish voters in Lebanon cast their ballots for the re-election of Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the first round of the Turkish presidential election on May 14, according to official statistics published by the Turkish Higher Electoral Committee.
Several French and Turkish media outlets claimed that this made Lebanon the country where the vote for Erdogan was "the highest in the world."
At the end of the second round of the Turkish presidential elections on May 28, Erdogan was re-elected for an additional five years. He won 52.16 percent of the vote. Meanwhile, the social-democrat candidate, Kemal Kiliçdaroglu got 47.84 percent.
In Lebanon, a landslide victory
Official figures from the Turkish Higher Electoral Committee show that only 35.34 percent of Turks voting in Lebanon took part in the first round: 2,952 voted out of 8,353 registered voters. Thirteen invalid votes were recorded and of the votes cast, 95.44 percent voted for Erdogan. This constituted a landslide victory for the Turkish president in Lebanon, with his opponent Kemal Kiliçdaroglu garnering just 4.01% of the vote in the country.
The statistics for the second round of voting have not yet been published on the official website of the Electoral Committee, but some Turkish and French media outlets have claimed that voters in Lebanon gave Recep Tayyip Erdogan the most votes of any country. Turkey's Daily Sabah, a media outlet close to Erdogan, reports that he also won 95.4 percent of the vote in the second round in Lebanon.
Several Lebanese did not show their support for the Turkish president in the presidential election, particularly in the second round. In Tripoli, an army of motorcyclists clad with the red Turkish flag blocked the streets and set off fireworks to celebrate Erdogan's re-election on May 28, even before the votes had been counted. Similar parades took place in Saida, south Lebanon.
