Turkey's ruling party set for landslide poll win

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ANKARA: Turkey's ruling party is set for a record landslide win in Sunday's parliamentary polls and a third straight term in power, according to a projection and partial results.

A survey of results from sample ballot boxes across the country projected the AKP would get 50.3 percent of the vote, its highest electoral score so far, and enough parliamentary seats to once again form the government on its own.

The main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) was set to finish second with 27.1 percent, followed by the Nationalist Action Party (MHP) with 12.7 percent, according to the projection, conducted by the A&G polling company.

An estimate of the distribution of seats in the 550-member parliament is hard but the AKP may narrowly clinch the 330-seat majority it is seeking to press ahead with plans to rewrite the constitution, the legacy of a 1980 military coup, A&G chairman Adil Gur said.

With more than 60 percent of the vote counted, the AKP was leading with 51.9 percent of the vote, according to results carried.

Its lead is expected to decrease a bit as counting progresses, since the first results come from the rural east, where the party is stronger compared to the more urban west, analysts said.

The AKP owes its enduring popularity mostly to economic success and improved public services following years of financial instability that haunted Turkey under shaky coalition governments in the past.

Under the AKP, the economy grew by 8.9 percent in 2010, outpacing global recovery, and per capita income has doubled to $10,079.

Voting ended at 5:00 pm (1400 GMT) across the country, where more than 50 million people were eligible to vote, out of a population of some 73 million.

Earlier, an ecstatic crowd burst into cheers and applause as Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan arrived to vote in a school in Istanbul's Uskudar district, an AKP stronghold. "Turkey is proud of you," the crowd chanted, as the prime minister shook hands with supporters.

His economic credits aside, Erdogan -- once the driving force of EU-sought reforms -- has come under fire for autocratic tendencies and growing intolerance of criticism.

With dozens of journalists in jail, the opposition is alarmed also over creeping restrictions on the Internet and an unprecedented outbreak of compromising wiretaps and videos of opposition figures circulating online.

Erdogan has promised a more liberal constitution but has refused to specify what the overhaul would entail, fanning speculation with his advocacy of a presidential system for Turkey -- presumably with himself at the helm.

The AKP needs at least 330 seats to amend the constitution without support from other parties and put it to a referendum. A two-thirds majority of 367 seats would enable the party to pass the amendments unilaterally.(AFP)