×
Messages of Gül...
Paylaş
LinkedinFlipboardLinki KopyalaYazı Tipi
There is a very well established tradition in the Turkish media. If a newspaper reports a scoop or writes about an issue before others, the other papers turn a blind eye on that issue for a while and at a further date cooks up the same rotten dish as if it is a new issue or happening. Rather than indulging into that old habit, I would start with stressing my appreciation for Yavuz Baydar for what appeared to me as the first-ever comprehensive interview with Abdullah Gül ever since he became president.
In that interview, Gül talked on many issues, but the most pressing ones were regarding the need to speed up reforms in the country and the relationship between himself and his former political boss and comrade, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
Gül was optimistic that despite the trauma the closure case caused as well as the Constitutional Court annulment of a set of constitutional amendments the ruling Justice and Development Party, or AKP, had undertaken in collaboration with the opposition Nationalist Movement Party, or MHP, in hopes of legalizing Islamist headgear or turbans at universities, if there was will there ought to be a way of overcoming the existing difficulties. He was stressing that if in all the draft constitution texts prepared over the past years by many parties, bas associations and nongovernmental organizations, or NGOs, the common denominators were enhancing democracy, individual rights, upholding supremacy of law, it must be obvious for everyone that all difficulties Ñ including the perception that the Constitutional Court annulment has made it impossible for the legislature to carry out constitutional amendments Ñ could be overcome if a common will and joint effort could be forged.
Indeed, the president was right. Gül, who served many years as foreign minister, thus as the top diplomat of the country, was putting the requirements of how to revive the constitutional reform drive in a very diplomatic manner and in essence sending a very strong message to his former boss, Prime Minister Erdoğan. For years, many people who have been supporting the reform drive and the European Union bid of the country have been critical of the singlehanded approach of the prime minister and his majoritarian mentality. The prime minister has been refusing all the calls for establishing a national consensus on major issues of the country, particularly on major reform moves. However, obsessed with having an outstanding majority in Parliament and believing that this empowers him to undertake whatever he wishes in the fashion he wishes, the premier was not even talking with the main opposition leader.
Now, Gül is stressing that a "nice understanding and working atmosphere" need to be established in order to revive the reform movement and underlining his conviction that with such an approach Turkey can even rewrite a liberal and democratic constitution.
Let’s hope that this message finds its way and reaches to the prime minister whose staff is so scared of his anger against criticisms that they are providing Erdoğan only the newspaper clippings of articles that are not critical about himself, the government or the AKP.
Friends since 1968
The reply of Gül as regards to a question whether there was a "confrontation atmosphere" between himself of Erdoğan was a demonstration of the importance the president attached to freedom of thought and freedom of press as well though he was careful to underline that "as two close friends since 1968" it was out of the question for him and Erdoğan to be at odds. "I do see as well what’s being written from time to time and consider them as normal because in a country where there is free press, where there is an open society, sometimes such things might be written with the belief that such things did indeed happenÉ" Gül, perhaps, must have some tea with his old friend Erdoğan and explain him as well that instead of yelling to the media or calling boycott of some newspapers, or demanding a publisher to make sure to "write correct stuff or close down that paper," he should try to respect freedom of thought and freedom of media and try to be more transparent.
After all, Turkey is a country transforming to the good and to the bad. While we are becoming a more conservative country and nation on the one hand, on the other we are enhancing our ability to discuss even the taboos of yesterdayÉ Neither the president, nor the prime minister Ñ and of course the military Ñ are beyond limits of criticism in today’s Turkey. It was good to see that at least the president was aware of thisÉ
Gül was optimistic that despite the trauma the closure case caused as well as the Constitutional Court annulment of a set of constitutional amendments the ruling Justice and Development Party, or AKP, had undertaken in collaboration with the opposition Nationalist Movement Party, or MHP, in hopes of legalizing Islamist headgear or turbans at universities, if there was will there ought to be a way of overcoming the existing difficulties. He was stressing that if in all the draft constitution texts prepared over the past years by many parties, bas associations and nongovernmental organizations, or NGOs, the common denominators were enhancing democracy, individual rights, upholding supremacy of law, it must be obvious for everyone that all difficulties Ñ including the perception that the Constitutional Court annulment has made it impossible for the legislature to carry out constitutional amendments Ñ could be overcome if a common will and joint effort could be forged.
Indeed, the president was right. Gül, who served many years as foreign minister, thus as the top diplomat of the country, was putting the requirements of how to revive the constitutional reform drive in a very diplomatic manner and in essence sending a very strong message to his former boss, Prime Minister Erdoğan. For years, many people who have been supporting the reform drive and the European Union bid of the country have been critical of the singlehanded approach of the prime minister and his majoritarian mentality. The prime minister has been refusing all the calls for establishing a national consensus on major issues of the country, particularly on major reform moves. However, obsessed with having an outstanding majority in Parliament and believing that this empowers him to undertake whatever he wishes in the fashion he wishes, the premier was not even talking with the main opposition leader.
Now, Gül is stressing that a "nice understanding and working atmosphere" need to be established in order to revive the reform movement and underlining his conviction that with such an approach Turkey can even rewrite a liberal and democratic constitution.
Let’s hope that this message finds its way and reaches to the prime minister whose staff is so scared of his anger against criticisms that they are providing Erdoğan only the newspaper clippings of articles that are not critical about himself, the government or the AKP.
Friends since 1968
The reply of Gül as regards to a question whether there was a "confrontation atmosphere" between himself of Erdoğan was a demonstration of the importance the president attached to freedom of thought and freedom of press as well though he was careful to underline that "as two close friends since 1968" it was out of the question for him and Erdoğan to be at odds. "I do see as well what’s being written from time to time and consider them as normal because in a country where there is free press, where there is an open society, sometimes such things might be written with the belief that such things did indeed happenÉ" Gül, perhaps, must have some tea with his old friend Erdoğan and explain him as well that instead of yelling to the media or calling boycott of some newspapers, or demanding a publisher to make sure to "write correct stuff or close down that paper," he should try to respect freedom of thought and freedom of media and try to be more transparent.
After all, Turkey is a country transforming to the good and to the bad. While we are becoming a more conservative country and nation on the one hand, on the other we are enhancing our ability to discuss even the taboos of yesterdayÉ Neither the president, nor the prime minister Ñ and of course the military Ñ are beyond limits of criticism in today’s Turkey. It was good to see that at least the president was aware of thisÉ
Paylaş
LinkedinFlipboardLinki KopyalaYazı Tipi
