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Erdogan's
Galloping Despotism
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Turkish
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, seconds before being thrown and
trampled by a horse in Istanbul, July 2013.
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Both fascism and communism exercised a large influence on the Arab
"Baathist" ideology -- "resurrection" in Arabic, and
which started as a nationalist, Sunni Arab movement to combat Western
colonial rule and to promote modernization. In Iraq, the despotic
Baathist regime survived 35 years, largely under the leadership of Saddam
Hussein. In Syria, it is still struggling under the tyranny of President
Bashar al-Assad. These days a non-Arab, but Islamist version of the
Baathist ideology is flourishing in an otherwise unlikely country:
candidate for membership in the European Union (EU), Turkey.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's increasing authoritarianism is
killing Turkey's already slim chances of finding itself a place in the
world's more civilized clubs and turning the country more and more into a
"Baathist" regime.
In 2004 Erdogan's government abolished the death penalty as part of
his ambitions at the time to join the EU. Twelve years later, on Oct. 29,
2016, Erdogan addressed fans of his party, and said he would ratify
a bill reinstating capital punishment once it passed in parliament
despite objections it might spark in the West. He said: "Soon, our
government will bring (the bill) to parliament ... It's what the people
say that matters, not what the West thinks".
EU officials had warned in July that such a move would kill Turkey's
accession process. If Turkey reintroduces the death penalty, said
Federica Mogherini, the EU's foreign policy chief, it will not be joining
the European Union. "Let me be very clear on one thing," she said,
"... No country can become an EU member state if it introduces [the]
death penalty."
European
Union foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini, seen above greeting
Turkish Minister for EU Affairs Omer Celik in Brussels last June, says
that reintroduction the death penalty will disqualify Turkey from
joining the EU.
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On October 30, Europe once again warned Turkey. "Executing the death penalty is
incompatible with membership of the Council of Europe," the
47-member organization, which includes Turkey, tweeted.
The potential re-introduction of the death penalty is not the only
"Baathist" signal Erdogan's Turkey is making. A court in the
predominantly Kurdish province of Diyarbakir arrested Gulten Kisanak and
Firat Anli, the Kurdish co-mayors, following their detention, in the
latest blow to political opposition in Turkey.
The co-mayors are being charged with "being a member of an armed
terrorist group," while Anli is also charged with "trying to
separate land under the state's sovereignty."
"Arrest is a legal term, but [in Turkey] there is no law," said Selahattin Demirtas, co-chairman of a
pro-Kurdish opposition party. "This is abduction and
kidnapping."
Erdogan could not care less. He is busy strengthening his one-man
rule. A governmental state of emergency decree on October 29 gave Erdogan powers directly to appoint presidents to
nearly 200 universities in the country. Before that decree, he had to
choose from three candidates offered by a central board that oversees
higher education, based on free elections at universities.
Before the Turks could digest so many undemocratic practices they had
to face in one week, they woke up only to learn that scores of
journalists at a newspaper critical of Erdogan had been detained. On
October 31, police raided the homes of 11 people, including executives
and journalists of Cumhuriyet newspaper, after prosecutors
initiated a probe against them on "terrorism" charges. Cumhuriyet
said detention warrants were issued for 15 journalists. The prosecutor's
office said the operation was based on accusations that the suspects were
"committing crimes on behalf of two terror organizations."
Large crowds gathered outside the Cumhuriyet office in Istanbul
to protest the detention of journalists, while leading press
organizations also slammed the raids. The Contemporary Journalists
Association released a written statement, saying:
This is about ... abolishing all
universal values including the right to live and social rights. The most
explicit indications of it are the growing pressure against the Turkish
press and the policies to destroy it. This is the process of the
destruction of free thought.
Precisely. "Universal liberties" and "Turkey" have
already become a very unpleasant oxymoron. Erdogan's populism, based on
religious conservatism and ethnic nationalism, are fast driving Turkey
toward Arab Baathism instead of Western democratic culture.
Burak Bekdil is an Ankara-based
columnist for the Turkish newspaper Hürriyet Daily News and a fellow at the
Middle East Forum.
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