Turkey’s ruling party has launched a social media campaign to counter the opposition’s highly popular Twitter hashtag #herşeyçokgüzelolacak (Everything will be OK), claiming that the İstanbul election results were canceled because the election was stolen by the opposition.
The campaign was started by the Justice and Development Party’s (AKP) İstanbul candidate, Binali Yıldırım, who told reporters who had asked why the results were canceled that “it is simply because they stole the election.”
The hashtag #çünküçaldılar (because they stole) appeared on Twitter’s worldwide trending topics list on Saturday evening, as pro-AKP celebrities and TV personalities supported it with videos.
Turkey’s Supreme Election Board on Monday canceled the election results and ruled that a new election for İstanbul mayor be held on June 23. The
AKP desperately needs to re-energize its grass roots to win İstanbul’s top mayoral position, which it lost narrowly on March 31.