It wasn’t so long ago that I was a huge fan of the Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his “moderate” brand of democratic Islamic governance. I admired him for propelling his nation into unprecedented stability and prosperity and for maintaining good relations with Turkey’s neighbors as well as the international community at large.
I applauded his outspokenness over Israel’s siege of Gaza and believed his support for the Strip’s Palestinian residents emanated from a place of compassion for those subsisting in the world’s largest open-air prison. No doubt, he should be commended for his stance against the Syrian regime and his generous hosting of over a million Syrian refugees, a figure expected to reach 1.5 million by the end of next year. When things are going his way, surely Turkey couldn’t wish for a better leader. But lately, the Erdogan’s other side has altered my perceptions.
Erdogan is a person who craves total control but when he feels his control slipping away, he petulantly lashes out without considering the consequences of his actions, relying on his pragmatic President Abdullah Gul to clean up his undiplomatic messes. It’s ironic that while he’s been bashing Egypt’s army and interim government for cracking down on violent protest and accusing Egyptian authorities of behaving undemocratically, he did the exact same thing himself during the summer of 2013 when he instructed security forces to forcibly clear environmentalist demonstrators from Taksim/Gezi Park. And now, in response to a police purge of bribery and corruption that netted 24 suspects — including sons of the interior and economy ministers and the head of a state-owned bank — he promptly sacked Istanbul’s chief of police as well as more than 70 police officers for what he termed “a dirty operation” to smear his government prior to upcoming municipal elections.
The premier hasn’t had enough time to probe whether or not such charges were warranted. He rather believes the police action is a personal affront to himself and his government. Clearly, the fact that police discovered $ 4.5 million salted away in shoe boxes at the home of Suleyman Aslan, Halkbank’s CEO, has done nothing to persuade him otherwise. Bankers especially aren’t usually known for keeping cash under their mattresses unless they’ve got something to hide.
Anywhere else on the planet the interference of a politician in police business would be scandalous and, indeed, many Turks are so outraged they went to the streets waving shoeboxes to protest corruption. Protesters were dispersed by riot police using teargas. Turkey’s prime opposition leader, head of the Republican People’s Party, Kemal Kilicdaroglu, accused Erdogan’s government of forfeiting legitimacy by shielding those allegedly involved corruption. Erdogan says he’ll go after rivals who try to capitalize on public unrest.
Erdogan points his finger at foreign influences for attempts to undermine him. “Those who cast slurs on my ministers to reach their dirty goals, you should know that this nation will spoil the game. We will break those hands if they are trying to set traps in this country,” he said. He further threatened to expel foreign diplomats engaged “in provocative actions,” a statement thought to be meant for the ears of the US Ambassador Francis Ricciardone judging by tweets from the Deputy Chairman of Erdogan’s AK Party, Salih Kapusuz, slamming Ricciardone for breaching diplomatic red lines and hinting that the Halkbank chief had been punished for not complying with a US request for the bank to cease cooperating with Iran.
Erdogan has shied away from implicating his one-time ally against the Turkish military’s grip on the country, the influential Turkish cleric, Fethullah Gulen, currently living in self-imposed exile in the US, who leads the Hizmet Movement. Erdogan and Gulen fell out when the government began shutting down Gulenist schools. Recently, the AK Party has accused Gulen’s substantial following of infiltrating the highest echelons of the police, the judiciary and the public prosecution citing a televised audio tape of Gulen instructing his flock to “move in the arteries of the system without anyone noticing… You must wait until you have acquired all of the state’s power.” Gulen has denied the tape’s authenticity as well as any suggestion that he instigated the high profile arrests.
Erdogan may be incensed about troublesome hands, both foreign and local, but people in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones. His gross interference in Egypt’s transition has led to downgrading of diplomatic relations between the two countries.
Analysts are split over Erdogan’s political longevity that is now in the balance over the corruption scandals as well as his split from the Hizmet movement, which supported him through three elections and whose followers — dubbed “ghosts” — could number in the millions. If he wields a heavy hand against protesters and if the bourse and currency continue to slide, his days in the top job could well be numbered.
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