30.06.2010

Liberal Islamic AKP government at the crossroads

The AKP government milked the Israeli attack on the Mavi Marmara as much as it could, writes Esen Uslu. But this international posturing is an attempt to divert attention from its domestic crisis

Domestic politics in Turkey has reached a new bottleneck. The ‘democratic overture’ policy of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government, which was adopted two years ago amid much phrasemongering but little content, is nearing the end of the road.

The AKP had proposed changing the constitution to give, among other things, parliament more control over the judiciary and allow military personnel to be tried more easily in civilian courts; but the government’s built-in majority was insufficient to allow it to amend the constitution and it was obliged to put its proposals to a referendum.

AKP was hoping for a quick poll in July. However, the ‘independent’ electoral commission decided that an obscure law relating to elections applied also to referendums, and ruled that this one could not be held until mid-September. You might ask, what is the importance of a few weeks? But the delay may make or break things during such a fragile time for Turkish politics.

Back in May, the nationalist-social democratic Republican People’s Party (CHP) was rocked by the release of a secretly recorded video showing its leader, Deniz Baykal, engaged in a sexual liaison with his former secretary, now an MP. The position of this stalwart of the military-civilian bureaucracy became untenable and he was forced to resign by the people he had served so faithfully for so long.

However, his last act as leader of the CHP had been to bring a case for the annulment of the constitutional amendment before the Constitutional Court. According to the CHP, the amendment would breach the ‘principle’ of the ‘separation of powers’ by curbing the judiciary’s ability to overturn parliamentary decisions, such as the vote in 2008 to remove the ban on the wearing of headscarves in state universities. It would also jeopardise the army’s role as ‘guardian of Turkish secularism’ against the AKP’s Islamist inroads.

Needless to say, the application to have the case heard before the September referendum was granted. That is how the law works in Turkey: if it benefits the civilian and military bureaucracy, everything is possible. Therefore, even before the amendment is put to a popular vote, the Constitutional Court can simply annul it - especially if a late public swing towards the AKP is detected.

Baykal was quickly replaced by Kemal KılıçdaroÄŸlu, an unassuming former bureaucrat turned politician, who was believed to be more likely to recover the CHP’s lost votes, and form a coalition government with the MHP (Nationalist Action Party, the remnants of infamous Grey Wolves paramilitary organisation) to get rid of the so-called ‘democratising-liberalising’ AKP government.

The new leader has impeccable credentials for pulling votes from different communities. KılıçdaroÄŸlu is a Kurd, but has never claimed Kurdishness as his identity; he is an Alevi, but he never lifted a finger for equal rights for the Alevi ethno-religious minority; and he is renowned for his impartial service as former head of the Social Insurance Institution - despite enrolling his baby grandson as a ‘working man’ under the social insurance scheme before a law changing retirement qualifications was passed, thus ensuring that his grandson will be able to retire about 10 years earlier than his peers. Truly the very best the dirty electoral politics of Turkey can come up with!

He was the ideal figurehead for the bureaucracy of the party, as well as for the military-civilian tutelage. And the lethargic CHP party machine suddenly began to act with renewed vigour after the Baykal wake-up call. The political vultures who had resigned from the CHP with a view to forming a rival party started to return to the nest. And a handful of independent MPs decided to come on board too.

Suddenly a referendum victory for the AKP is looking far from certain. If it goes ahead, a poor showing for the government would increase the pressure for an early election. Similarly an annulment of the constitutional amendment by the court would leave the AKP no way forward except through calling such an election. With the economic crisis still rampant and the CHP resurgent, that is not exactly what the AKP wants. However, its room for manoeuvre in domestic politics is very limited.

International moves

Against this background of military-civilian bureaucrats preparing to oust the AKP government and replace it with a CHP-MHP coalition, the AKP decided to act boldly in the international arena. Two moves have created a furore, both of which were designed to cement politicised Islamists - seen as the natural popular base of the AKP, despite a recent offensive by new and more radical Islamists - behind the party.

The first gambit was to pursue, together with Brazil, an agreement with Iran, with Barack Obama’s personal approval, regarding the exchange of enriched material for nuclear fuel. The offer was on the table last autumn, but did not come to fruition because of the intransigence of Iran. As the negotiations at the UN security council pointed to the imposition of new sanctions against Iran, Brazil and Turkey ‘persuaded’ Tehran to strike a last-minute deal. Supposedly Iran would transfer its enriched nuclear material to be stored in Turkey, and the international community would provide nuclear fuel for its research reactors.

But it was too late to win the international brownie points the AKP was seeking. Despite its press acclaiming Turkish diplomacy’s ‘outstanding success’, the imperialist powers had already made up their minds to impose sanctions. Timing is everything in international politics, and suddenly suspicions were aroused about the intentions of the Turkish government. Was it trying to assist the ‘international community’ or trying to save the skins of the cornered Iranian Islamists? As the US state department railed against Turkey and Brazil, the Brazilian government acted most undiplomatically in publishing a letter from Obama sanctioning their efforts. What is more, both Turkey and Brazil voted against new sanctions and suddenly Turkey was out of line with its Nato allies on this key issue.

However, defending Iran against the US, as well as persuading an intransigent Iranian regime to come to terms with a negotiated settlement, won quite important domestic support for the AKP government.

The second important step taken by Turkey in the international arena has been in relation to the increasing pressure on the Israeli government. The deterioration of Turkey’s relations with Israel became apparent at the Devos meetings in January 2009, when prime minister Recep Tayyip ErdoÄŸan made an impromptu attack on Israeli president Shimon Peres and stormed out. This followed the start of the Israeli offensive on Gaza in December 2008. The Turkish government had been trying to act as honest broker between Syria, Palestine and Israel, and Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert made a working visit to Turkey for talks with ErdoÄŸan and president Abdullah Gul. But this was just a few days before the impending attack on Gaza and Olmert did not even hint at what was coming. Looking back at the official communiqué of that meeting, it is clear to what extent the Turkish government was duped by the Israelis.

The escalation in the worsening relations continued when Turkey barred Israel from participating in the annual ‘Anatolian Eagle’ air force exercises in June 2009 after five years of taking part. The Israelis delayed the delivery of a Heron unmanned aerial vehicle - much desired by the Turkish army for counterinsurgency operations in Kurdistan. The Israeli government also played silly games, such as seating the Turkish ambassador on a lower chair than others attending a function - and then making mocking propaganda out of it.

Mavi Marmara

Then, of course, there was Israel’s notorious May 31 attack on the Mavi Marmara, which was part of a flotilla of ships taking supplies to Gaza in a direct challenge to the Israeli blockade. In fact, although it had kept itself at arm’s length, the Turkish government had taken steps to make the Mavi Marmara, a former state-owned ferry, available for purchase by an NGO specialising in ‘humanitarian aid’. Obviously the purchase of a ship from a state-owned company could not easily be achieved without political clout, especially as its seaworthiness was in doubt.

The Islamist peace activists involved had only become pro-Palestine once Hamas gained ascendancy (albeit with overt and covert Israeli assistance). Before that only the Turkish left supported the Palestinians - and were branded “infidel terrorists” by the same Islamists. Also on the ship were moderate peace activists and international observers, selected members of the Turkish Islamist press and committed Islamist blockade-busters, who were prepared to die if they were not successful in breaching the Israeli naval blockade.

What happened is well known. The Israeli navy and marines made a huge mess of their boarding operation. Some soldiers lowered from helicopters in the first-wave attack were given a beating, and the second wave opened fire from above, killing nine Turkish citizens and wounding more than 20 others. The ships were forced to dock in Israel, and everyone on board was arrested. The Turkish government moved swiftly to remove the wounded and arrested from Israeli hands, bringing them home on its own planes, and launched a sharp propaganda campaign against the Israeli government.

A few days after the incident more details started to emerge. For example, a few AKP MPs had been preparing to take part in the flotilla, but they quietly withdrew at the last minute. Their votes are too precious nowadays to lose in a blockade-busting operation. Although international criticism of Israel has tended to die down, the AKP government had gained international prestige in the Muslim world.

Israel’s bloodthirsty aggression gave the AKP a chance to play the valiant victim, and the true friend of oppressed Muslims. The AKP milked it as much as it could in the hope of adding a few more points to its share of the vote in the expected referendum.

The Turkish government and military has relied on the Israeli ‘defence industry’, which has provided crucial technological know-how. The Israelis have upgraded ancient F4 Phantoms for the Turkish air force to 2020 Terminator standard and extended their service life to 2015 at least. Those planes have regularly been used in cross-border raids into Iraqi Kurdistan. The Israelis also modernised the Turkish army’s M60 Patton tanks, providing them with new guns, fire control systems, engines and armour. Those tanks have also frequently been seen in the south-eastern corner of Turkey. I mentioned the Heron UAV above, and there are many other contracts.

Despite all this, the AKP government declared that unless an Israeli apology for its attack on the flotilla was forthcoming all military contracts would be terminated. It did not stop there. Liberal Islamist foreign minister Ahmet DavutoÄŸlu stated his desire to take part in the namaz prayer service to be held by the victorious Islamic forces in the Al-Aksa Mosque in Jerusalem, perched above the Temple Mount!

Lost initiative

The AKP’s ‘democratic overture’ consisted of multifaceted initiatives that it hoped would allow it to be seen as the healer of all Turkey’s ills. Its ‘Armenian initiative’ ended with a shotgun-wedding-style signing of an agreement between Turkey and Armenia under US pressure. However, the agreement was not worth the paper it was written on - internal opposition and Azerbaijani rejection of the settlement caused the AKP government to rescind it.

Its ‘Alevi initiative’ also came to nothing, since the constitutional amendments being proposed did not contain any concrete measures to deliver freedom of conscience and non-discrimination. The only sop to the Alevis was the state purchase of the Madimak Hotel, where 37 prominent Alevi artists and intellectuals were burned to death on July 2 1973. Even then, there was no commitment to convert it into a museum of remembrance, as the Alevi organisations have demanded.

The most drastic consequence of the failure of the ‘democratic overture’ policy was experienced in the AKP ‘Kurdish initiative’. When the government invited guerrillas to come down from the mountains to take part in the electoral process, a group did so and were met with great jubilation by the Kurdish people. That was the extent of the AKP government’s courage, and, facing a nationalist-fascist backlash, its resolve collapsed.

Since then the state, judiciary, police and army have maintained an offensive against the Kurdish freedom movement. The political party representing the Kurds was closed down, its leaders barred from participating in politics. More than 1,500 elected mayors, councillors and party officials were detained on charges of aiding and abetting terrorism. Almost the same number of minors were detained - charged, convicted and placed in adult jails for having thrown stones at the police during demonstrations, thus acting ‘for and on behalf of’ a terrorist organisation. And finally members of the peace group that came from the mountains were detained and charged because they were members of the PKK!

With the AKP’s hypocritical face well and truly exposed, the unilateral ceasefire declared and maintained by the armed wing of the PKK was rescinded, and armed clashes started to be reported at the beginning of June. Since then many people have died and there is no end to the violence in sight.

Democracy or fascism

While Turkey has changed a lot over the last few decades, and climbed up a few rungs in the capitalist world order, the age-old reality has yet to change: liberal, social democratic solutions to the country’s acute contradictions are ephemeral. However, those class-struggle contradictions have brought the alternatives into sharp relief: either fascism or democracy.

Not the kind of ‘liberal democracy’ where the people’s wings are clipped, but a full democracy under the leadership of the working class, which means the overthrow of the present state and its paraphernalia. In that regard there is not much difference between liberal Islam, with its prayers at Al-Aksa Mosque, and the Turkish supremacism of so-called social democracy, with a government seeking to freeze liberalising measures and turn the clock back to a ‘controlled democracy’ under the tutelage of the military-civilian bureaucracy.

The left in Turkey must muster all its forces now to avert such a disaster. First, it must avoid acting as an appendage of, and providing a left-leaning fig leaf for, the nationalist social democrats. Second, it must aim to bring together all oppressed forces, including Kurds fighting for freedom and equal rights, Alevis struggling for religious freedoms and equality, and the working class, which is now facing one of the most prolonged crises in living memory. We are facing defeat unless we manage to conduct joint action for democracy.