One and final Turkish ((Account Inventory)) before the expected change – Part Three

Of course, the hard work of President Erdoğan’s government continued to topple the Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad and his regime and to support the opposition movements, especially the Muslim Brotherhood movement, but this didn’t happen.

The Assad remained and didn’t fall because of the very nature of Syria’s relationship with Russia and Iran With the presence of the Lebanese Hezbollah as well, all these forces will not allow under any circumstances the fall of Assad and his regime and thus expose the Syrian situation to the Libyan scenario, with one fact remains clear that it is impossible to use any outside foreign military option to overthrow the Syrian regime, not through the United States or even through 30 countries coalition, as in Iraq in 1991, not even a sixty countries coalition.

No one in the West or the East will risk using military force to bring down the Syrian regime that is actually in a state of war with Israel, even if this state is just formal.

No one will risk endangering Israel’s security and risking military action against the Syrian regime, which is one of the things that have reassured the Syrian leadership.

It’s ironic that the Syrian leadership takes Israel as a hostage to protect itself against any outside foreign interference.

The regime in Syria, whether some wanted to accept it or not, has stood still and has not fallen despite the massive destruction that has occurred in all of Syria as a result of a continuous war that has consumed all the green and the land.

Without a doubt, the crisis in Syria has entered history as one of the worst crises in the world and in all respects, where the ugliness of events in all aspects, such as social, security, economical, and above all, the humanitarian aspect.

I do not want to depart from the subject of my article, which is about the domestic Turkish issue, but it was necessary to address the Syrian issue because it cast a heavy shadow on Turkey during the last decade.

I will start the talk about the Turkish domestic, by starting from the;

Judiciary

In one line, Judiciary in Turkey has become fully loyal to President Erdoğan.

After the failed coup attempt, a comprehensive purge campaign was carried out that included all governmental and non-governmental sites, centers, bodies, with more than 5,000 people were expelled from the judiciary body in Turkey, and the full judiciary system, is taking orders the government or, rather, President Erdoğan’s himself.

The meaning of this is that, any judgments or arrests will be decided and ordered by the government of President Erdoğan directly, without any kind of independence in the work of the judiciary body, today it has become under complete authority of President Erdoğan.

Army and Security

What President Erdoğan wants is to bring together all the military, security and intelligence agencies to be under his authority and direct supervision as a president that carry out all powers.

Therefore, he exploited the failure coup attempt to liquidate the most important and last stronghold of the secular system in the country, which is the army.

He completely cleared the army and security after the coup attempt failed.

The plan to purge the army in practice was not the result of the failure coup attempt.

It’s started since the first day of the arrival of his party to power after several military operations by the Turkish army against the Kurds during the past ten years, which was the most violent that took place in 2008 and lasted more than four months.

During and after these confrontations, the Turkish army and the military leadership was subjected to a series of harsh criticisms, because of high number of casualties and the actual failure to implement the plans that were supposed to be achieved through these military operations.

These events was followed by several attempts and plans, according to reports, clams by Erdoğan’s government, accusing military figures like in office or retired army officers, for planning and preparing for military coups against his government, with in fact many of them were subjected to face trials and with many of them received a multiple jail time verdicts, reminiscent of the scenario of the 1980 coup of Gen. Kenan Evren, which he, himself was brought to trial, by the government of Erdoğan on his coup in 1980, with also a possible role for him of being part of planning for new coup or godfathering coup attempt against the government of Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi (Justice and Development Party), similar to the process of military coup that took place in 1997 that overthrew the government of Necmettin Erbakan, the mentor of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and one of the historical leaders of the Islamic moderated political wing in Turkey.

Erdogan used his alliance with Fethullah Gülen movement from 2008 until 2012 to benefit from the influence of the Gülen movement and spread to reach its goal.

After arresting and expulsion of many elements and officers of the army, security and intelligence following the disclosure of several attempts and plans to implement coups resolved, when each one who was expelled from his position in service, a member or supporter of Fethullah Gülen, was appointed, later after the last failed coup attempt, Erdoğan was able to expel them and chase them all.

All the opponents of Erdoğan were eliminated from the army and security body, and both of them were completely under his control.

We can say that, the conflict between Fethullah Gülen and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan resolved in favor of the second one %100.

With more than 200,000 people from state departments and institutions, even in private sector were expelled on the pretext of their dependence on the Fethullah Gülen movement.

Anyone who is proven or even accused of belonging to or even sympathizing with the Gülen movement will be expelled from his work, alongside all his family members, in other word all the family of this person will be punished, whether in the public sector or private sector.

Political life

It is known that Turkey is a pluralistic country operating under secular system of the state and therefore any political party is free to work within these rules.

Thus, all the political parties in Turkey were similar to each other in general.

There was no radical difference in the idea of many Turkish parties, but in Turkey there are two major wings in political life before the AKP.

There is the Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi (Republican People’s Party), the party that was founded by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, a party that embodies the form of Turkey since the proclamation of the Republic, but the problem in this party, that cause this party to lose its luster by the time passes, due to the lack of renewal of it basis and go for some necessary referendums, and stayed old-fashioned in its image with the lack of leadership that has Charisma and ability to rally the Turkish people of all social sectors around it, because the problem of Turkey lies in the real identity crisis, between the secular society of the modern Turkey, and the society of the religious conservatives.

Most seculars, are those who are the modern European style kind of people who are rich and controls many businesses, while the vast majority portion of the community, which is the largest proportion are the middle class and the poor and most of the governor and devout, with a rural class, all these groups were the nucleus of AKP and the broad popular base, which devoted the existence of this party and its success and brought the Party and its leaders to the absolute power.

Also there are the Turkish nationalist parties, such as the Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi (Nationalist Movement Party), which represent the right wing in Turkey and these parties and their different affiliations, whose ideology is related to the history of Turkey «the Ottoman Empire» and the nationhood of the Turanic nation.

But the fundamental problem in this wing is the contradictory overlap between religiosity and Turkey’s history of the Ottoman Empire with the nationalist tide that in one way or another glorifies Atatürk himself and that is contradiction.

As for the Kurdish situation in the political life in Turkey.

Kurds, who are considered a major component of Turkish society, were not allowed to enter politics freely.

The specter of the PKK and Abdullah Öcalan remained a threat to all Kurds in Turkey, preventing them from working and living freely in Turkey.

In 2012, the Kurdish-Turkish politician Selahattin Demirtaş founded the Halkların Demokratik Partisi (Peoples’ Democratic Party), whose is founding story and its labor status is similar to that of the Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi (Justice and Development Party),

The Justice and Development Party (AKP) of Islamist-oriented parties have been banned for long periods in Turkey and the experience of Erdoğan Mentor Necmettin Erbakan and later Recai Kutan, with several failed attempts before the AKP’s successful arrival in power in 2002.

The Kurds simply respected this situation and did the same. After all the forms of the political parties that followed the Kurds were defied and defended the Kurdish issue and they were working to grant some justice and development to this large component in Turkish society.

Mr. Selahattin Demirtaş, who began his political career as a member of the Kurdish Left Democratic Party in 2007 and a deputy in parliament before being banned by the Supreme Constitutional Court in 2009 on the grounds that he was associated with the PKK.

He then became a deputy for the Kurdish leftist «Peace and Democracy» party, which was banned by the court for the same reasons.

He then founded the Halkların Demokratik Partisi (Peoples’ Democratic Party), with the journalist and feminist activist Figen Yüksekdağ, as I mentioned in 2012, the most important of this parties objective is to consolidate of all left wings political parties in one party.

Mr. Demirtaş entered the Turkish presidential election in 2014 and came third with 9.77% of the votes.

He entered the 2014 and 2015 elections for the Halkların Demokratik Partisi (Peoples’ Democratic Party).

He and his party came to the Turkish parliament and his party holds 80 seats out of 550, the current number of seats in the Turkish parliament, which President Erdoğan hopes to increase to 600 if his Constitutional Amendments, approved in the upcoming referendum.

The problem now is that a large part of the members of the Halkların Demokratik Partisi (Peoples’ Democratic Party) and the Kurds in particular, with Demirtaş himself are currently in prison.

The End of part 3