| Original Message |
By Jürgen Gottschlich (Login perspektif)
Forum Owner
Posted May 5, 2007 3:35 AM
The Turkish Presidential Election
The Ruling Party Gives up on Europe
Prime Minister Erdogan's AK Party is trying to secure its grip on all the main offices of state. In his commentary Jürgen Gottschlich says that this is because it has come to the conclusion that the chances of accession to the European Union have substantially diminished
| Bild: 
 A guardian of or a threat to democracy in Turkey - once again, Turkey is deeply divided | Turkey is in crisis: the military is threatening a coup, the presidential elections have been stopped by the constitutional court, millions of people have taken to the streets in protest, and the stock exchange seems close to collapse.
After years of political stability, the start of accession talks with the EU, and an average annual growth rate of 7 per cent over the past four years, it looked as if Turkey had finally put the chaos of the nineties behind it. And now this!
Why this sudden return to conditions that seemed to be a thing of the past? Why is the military butting in again? Why have millions of people taken to the streets in Ankara and Istanbul in two major demonstrations to protest against the highly successful government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan?
What triggered this current crisis was the start of the presidential election process. Presidential elections have often led to crisis in Turkey — the election of the current president, Ahmet Necdet Sezer, for example, was not a simple process. Back then, in early 2000, the problem stemmed from the fact that a coalition had to hold complex negotiations in order to find a joint candidate.
This time, it should have been a piece of cake for the ruling AK Party. With a comfortable absolute majority in parliament, they only had to wait for the third round of voting - when they would no longer need two-thirds of the vote, but only a simple majority - to vote in their candidate by themselves.
But what should have been a case of simply putting their man in the post turned out, in retrospect, to be the crux of the problem for the AKP. Tayyip Erdogan, Abdullah Gül, Bülent Arinc, and the rest of the AKP leadership assumed they would not have to make any compromises. A majority is a majority.
| Bild: 
Showing their dıscontent - pro-secular demonstrators wave Turkish flags during a rally in Istanbul | For months, the AKP ignored both parliamentary and extra-parliamentary criticism of their intended takeover of the presidency. It was only when the warnings from the military became increasingly vehement that Erdogan had second thoughts and, shortly before the deadline for registering candidates expired, presented to the AKP leadership his preferred candidate: Defence Minister Vecdi Gönül.
Although Gönül is a member of the AKP, his wife is one of the few ministers' wives not to wear a headscarf, and, as defence minister, he might have been acceptable to the military.
But it was too late. On the one hand, Erdogan's party rebelled and, on the other, there was such discontent in society at the AKP's plans to push their candidate through, that many people no longer wanted to swallow any AKP candidate, regardless of who it was.
How could it come to this? Did Erdogan simply underestimate the resistance? Why else was the AKP not prepared to compromise earlier? It is clear that the AKP leadership had underestimated the extent of the resistance, but there is another reason why Erdogan and his party particularly wanted to control not only the post of prime minister and that of parliamentary president, but also the post of president itself. That reason lies in the EU's behaviour towards Turkey.
In December 2006, after an already tough negotiation process, the EU decided to postpone negotiations on eight important chapters until Turkey opened its ports and airports to Greek Cypriots. As a result, the AKP made a strategic decision: it would shift its focus away from the EU and shore up its power at home.
| Bild: 
Although Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül was the country's most popular politician, there was strong opposition from the populace against his candidacy | Erdogan had long hoped to win future elections as the politician who had paved Turkey's way to Europe. But after the EU's decision in December, it became clear to him that the European ticket would no longer score him any points with the voters.
On the contrary, Europe's rejection would ultimately backfire on him. That meant an end to his hope that the traditional tensions between the country's opposing camps would be gradually overcome by the advance towards Europe and a general increase in prosperity. So from the start of this year, the AKP's policy changed to one of securing power.
Although the Turkish president does not have executive power, he can intervene in the legislative process and by appointing significant officials play a much more active role than, for example, his German counterpart. Control of the presidency would give the AKP control of the bureaucracy and thus ensure its long-term power. It is also for this reason that the opposition wants to prevent the AKP from completing its takeover of the country's top positions at all costs.
Although its opponents have long accused the AKP of only serving its clientele, this has really only become the case as the chances of EU membership have declined. That is true on both sides: if the military had seen EU membership as a realistic possibility, it would have never threatened a putsch.
As it is, Turkish politics and society have been thrown back on themselves and are reacting in an all too familiar way. Neither side will give an inch; both think that it is the other who should make the compromises. A change is not to be expected in the foreseeable future.
Jürgen Gottschlich
© Qantara.de 2007
Translated from the German by Michael Lawton
http://www.qantara.de/webcom/show_article.php/_c-301/_nr-87/i.html?PHPSESSID=48c63128d514c438b5abb754982d71ce |
|
;)
;)
;)