ANKARA

Türkiye will hold a second-round runoff on May 28 to elect the president after no candidate won an outright majority in Sunday's poll, the head of the nation’s election authority announced on Monday.

The first round of voting ended with no candidate able to clear the required 50% threshold, but incumbent Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan took the lead, said Ahmet Yener, head of the Supreme Election Council, citing unofficial results.

Voter turnout in Sunday’s elections was 88.92%, with turnout from Turkish citizens abroad at 52.69%, Yener said.

Data entry continues for 35,874 ballots cast abroad, he noted.

Erdogan, joint candidate for the People's Alliance, and his closest competitor Kemal Kilicdaroglu, main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) chair and joint candidate for the six-party opposition Nation Alliance, will face off in the second round.

Erdogan finished the first round with 49.51% of the vote, with Kilicdaroglu second at 44.88%, Yener said.

Sinan Ogan of the ATA (Ancestral) Alliance got 5.17%, while Muharrem Ince, who withdrew from the presidential race late last week after ballots had already been printed, got 0.44%, Yener added.

Millions of voters went to the polls on Sunday to elect the country's president and members of its 600-seat parliament.

More than 64.1 million people were registered to vote, including over 1.76 million who cast their ballots abroad and 4.9 million first-time voters.

A total of 192,214 ballot boxes were set up for voters in the country.

Every voter cast two ballots, one for the president and the other for parliamentary deputies, all of whom are set to serve five-year terms.

More than 30 political parties and over 150 independent parliamentary candidates competed in the elections.

There were five multiparty blocs in the running: the People's Alliance, Nation Alliance, Ancestral Alliance, Labor and Freedom Alliance, and Union of Socialist Forces Alliance.​​​​​​​