Erdogan leads Turkey - and the
Middle East By M K Bhadrakumar
Situating oneself in a fairly recent
decade, if one were to suggest that someday
Turkey, a staunchly secularist country, could have
an Islamist head of government, it would have
seemed a joke. And to suggest that an Islamist
leader could as well prove to be the
longest-serving leader in that country, second
only to Kemal Attaturk, its founder and father
figure, would have seemed a macabre joke.
"No way, the Pashas will never
allow it to happen." That would be the repartee.
The Pashas, or civil or military
authorities, are confined to barracks. The results
of the parliamentary elections held in Turkey on
Sunday need to be put in historical perspective.
Without doubt, the resounding victory by
the ruling party AKP
(Justice and Development
Party) led by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan,
with a mandate of 50% of popular support is a
landmark event. Victory was expected, but not on a
scale exceeding the 47% mandate of the 2007
elections.
The heart of the matter is that
Turkey is reaching unprecedented heights of
economic prosperity and is a land at peace after
several decades of strife, bloodshed and chronic
political instability. The contrast couldn't be
sharper with its neighborhood, which is passing
through great upheaval and uncertainties.
Turkey's economy grew at a rate of 9% last
year, second only to China's among the Group of
20. The economy is already the world's 17th
largest and growing income is beginning to
percolate and give people hope of a better
tomorrow.
Today, Turkey borrows more
cheaply than Spain; a far cry from the
not-too-distant past when it used to hold a
begging bowl before the International Monetary
Fund (IMF). Yet, it also showcases the IMF's
success. Turkey has been one of IMF's biggest
borrowers - US$25 billion in the past decade - but
is well-poised to pay back its debts by 2013. The
contrast with Greece, a pristine European Union
(EU) member country, is at once obvious.
Unsurprisingly, a Turkish name that
spontaneously sailed into view as a terrific
candidate for the vacant post of managing director
of IMF was of Kemal Davis, who nursed the sick
Turkish economy at a critical phase when it was in
intensive care. Arguably, it would have been a
bitter pill to swallow for EU member countries if
a brilliant Turkish wizard were to be employed to
restore their economies to recovery.
Explaining Erdogan's mandate
Ironically, as a Bloomberg report wrote,
"Rebuffed in its efforts to join the EU, Turkey
now borrows at 10-year yields lower than at least
eight members of the 27-nation bloc." The Turkish
electorate is grateful to Erdogan's government for
successful economic management. However, Erdogan's
renewed mandate to lead the country for a third
successive four-year term demands a much broader
explanation.
Personal charisma was
certainly a factor, as there is no one today in
Turkish politics who can even come up to his
shoulders in sheer stature as a statesman. It is a
saga that becomes the stuff of an absorbing
political biography - a long journey from the
backstreets of a Black Sea town to Ankara via
Istanbul, from a prison cell to the office of the
prime minister, from rabble-rousing Islamism to
consensual politics, from a Turkish politician to
a towering regional figure who might very well end
up in the years ahead moulding the New Middle East
in a far more enduring and humane way than the
Ottomans from Suleiman the Magnificent could
manage through centuries.
The Turkey which
Erdogan inherited in 2003 was a practicing
democracy in appearance but still had common
characteristics with the authoritarian regimes of
the Middle East.
The military as the
self-appointed Praetorian Guards of the Turkish
state; the strong authoritarian undercurrent of
the "deep state"; coercion as the instrument to
smother dissent; a form of secularism that was as
militant and suffocating as any religious
extremism; the deep-rooted religiosity of the
common people who were observant Muslims but
steeped in worldly concerns; and, the inability or
refusal to comprehend and to come to terms with
political Islam - these were as much features of
the Turkish crisis. Erdogan proved himself to
be a "liberator" and a "conqueror". He gently
eased Turkey to face the reality that practicing
or holding religious beliefs is not antithetical
to the state or modernity. The thought churning
through the Turkish mind when Erdogan took over
the leadership was whether the practice of women
wearing headscarves was compatible with the tenets
of a secularist state.
There are two
Erdogans in evidence. In his first term, as he
began the project to roll back the Turkish "deep
state" and to ease the country of its dogmatic
notions regarding the essence of secularism, he
knew he was taking on a formidable challenge and a
vicious backlash was to be expected.
So,
Erdogan resorted to the politics of moderation and
became a "centrist". He made great tactical use of
Turkey's EU membership bid to push forward his
reform program. This approach helped him form a
rainbow coalition of large industrialists,
Islamist conservatives and liberals, Kurdish
nationalists and sections of the intelligentsia
which were, per se, antithetical to the politics
of Islamism.
The strategy of stooping to
conquer paid off and Erdogan presided over what is
arguably one of the most transformative periods of
Turkish history. Turkey is indeed a vastly
different country compared to what it was in 2002
when the AKP first came to power.
During
his second term in office from 2007, Erdogan
turned out to be a different man. He was much more
assertive and confident, borne out of the
awareness that he was no longer leading the party
of the underdog - AKP had become a Turkish
"establishment" party par excellence.
He
saw no further use of his "centrist" coalition. As
a prominent columnist put it in the Hurriyet
newspaper:
Moderation brought the AKP
popularity. Yet the more popular it became, the
more the AKP felt it could ignore centrist
consensual politics and the liberal vision of EU
membership. In due course, the party abandoned
the EU process and instead started to go after
those who disagreed with it, including the media
and the courts.
Ten years later, Mr
Erdogan still has the support of
Islamist-conservatives, but the rest of his
coalition has abandoned him. Liberals have left
the AKP for its lackluster commitment to Europe.
Large businesses are disheartened by
heavy-handed treatment of secular companies by
the AKP.
The criticism is somewhat
uncharitable. The EU didn't help matters with
Germany and France in particular making it
abundantly clear that Turkey's hopes of taking
habitation in a common European home would always
remain a pipedream. The AKP reacted to the EU's
arrogance of politico-cultural superiority.
Erdogan's choices Apart from
the Westernized sections of Turkish elites, people
on the whole resented the EU's attitude. Turkish
nationalism, which has always remained a strong
undercurrent, reared its head. Thus, on the one
hand, Erdogan's hands were forced by the EU, while
on the other hand, he estimated that it was also
the smart thing to do - to seize the moment to
career away from Western-style reforms toward
Turkish-style reforms.
Underlying all this
was Erdogan's own personality. He is an archetypal
Turk who can be stubborn, who should never be
rubbed the wrong way; impulsive and large-hearted,
and amiable and dominating at the same time.
The path that Erodgan chooses to take in
his forthcoming term is already a matter of
animated discussion. The AKP's mandate translates
as 326 seats in the 550-member parliament, which
is 40 short of the two-thirds majority he needs to
amend the constitution and four short of the 330
seats he needs to seek a referendum over a
constitutional reform.
The AKP needs to
draw the support of the left-of-center Republican
People's Party (135 seats), the
ultra-nationalistic Nationalist Movement Party (53
seats) or the Kurdish party Peace and Democratic
Party (36 seats).
Erdogan has projected as
a major agenda of the new government the drafting
of a new constitution that would include "basic
rights and freedoms", replacing the 1982
constitution drawn after the 1980 military coup
d'etat. Few details are available as to what
Erdogan has on his mind. Murat Yetkin, one of
Turkey's most respected editors, wrote:
The voters wanted to see Erdogan and
his government in power for another four years
but asked him to seek compromise for a new
constitution with opposition parties. Is Erdogan
going to look for common ground with opposition
and with whom? The answer to it will shape the
Turkish politics in the months
ahead.
In sum, Erdogan has to
reconcile the two "halves" of Turkey - secular and
liberal Turks on the one hand and a large
established Islamic conservative elite with a
well-organized political party on the other.
Equally, what lies ahead of him is also a
challenge that these two "halves" should be
willing to reconcile. Any disharmony can be
disruptive while the high probability is that
Erdogan will bring Islam and democracy together,
since overarching all personal traits and
political compulsions, he is also conscious by now
that he is destined to be a man of history. Thus,
he vowed to embrace the whole nation in his first
victory speech on Sunday:
Our nation assigned us to draft the
new constitution. They gave us a message to
build the new constitution through consensus and
negotiation. We will discuss the new
constitution with opposition parties, civil
society groups and academics. We will seek the
broadest consensus.
We will draft a
civilian, pro-freedom, participatory
constitution together. It will be constitution
of Turks, Kurds ... the Roma
minorities.
What lends enchantment to
the view is that it is all going to be Erdogan's
and Turkey's choice - a choice that will be made
not because of American or European pressure. (The
deep-rooted "anti-Americanism" in Turkey is as
intense as in Pakistan with only 10% Turks viewing
the United States favorably.) Second, the entire
Muslim Middle East is curiously watching the
choices that Erdogan makes in his third term.
Erdogan is well-placed to plant an iron
signpost for the road that the Muslim Brotherhood
can take in Egypt or Jordan; what quintessentially
Shi'ite empowerment can mean within a democratic
framework in Iraq, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait
or Bahrain without the Muslim psyche having to
tear itself apart; how despite Arabism, the Middle
East can still pull on excellently well with the
West, as Erdogan indeed is doing, despite being an
Islamist and a proud Turk.
Ambassador
M K Bhadrakumar was a career diplomat in
the Indian Foreign Service. His assignments
included the Soviet Union, South Korea, Sri Lanka,
Germany, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Kuwait
and Turkey.
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