Mr Erdogan’s political gamble

By Ahmet Abidin Ozbek:

The unpredictable nature of the Turkish state and government has not changed much since the 1920s. Obviously, there is a state inside the state – as with Russian dolls. Sometimes, you cannot find out who is really in charge of the state or government in Turkey. Each institution – government, ministries, military, police forces, judicial system, political parties and organizations etc. – has hidden internal structures and has been corrupted for a long time through its involvement in crimes against humanity.

In the apparent picture of Turkey, Mr Erdogan and his AKP party have become the favorite of millions.  Most people in Turkey voted for him because they regarded him as a man of honor who was willing to fight against corruption and crimes against humanity, and particularly against the Kurdish people. The people of Anatolia thought Mr Erdogan and also Mr Gul were both very determined to accomplish a democratic transformation of Turkey through reforms and unconditional peace talks on Kurdistan. Mr. Erdogan has promised almost everyone benefits from his reforms and democratization of Turkey. People truly believed him about these future positive changes. He also said he wanted to make reforms on social and economic issues. Additionally he talked about trying to establish new relationships with neighboring countries.

But what happened to the promises of reforms and peace talks? All these matters  have suddenly been forgotten because Mr Erdogan’s own agenda or preferences were different to what people thought. It is a revelation akin to the recent earthquake which has caused so much devastation. But I guess the materials used for construction were poor and so the earthquake easily destroyed so much. Or, as a second analogy, there are many animals that change their colors or shift their shapes depending on the circumstances. That’s exactly what Mr Erdogan did.  Once he tasted his power over the political and economic situation in Turkey, he became more and more authoritarian in character.

You might have noticed that the AKP, Mr Erdogan and Mr Gul have no program, road map or project to show in detail how they will solve the Kurdish question. Any other matter became more important to Mr Erdogan. He started to talk more about international politics, the Palestine problem, Israel, Syria, Egypt, Libya and other countries – acting like the Sultan of a new Ottoman Empire.  As a part of the game he diverted people’s attention to other matters and he tried to become more powerful economically. He preferred to show that he is a sort of new peacemaker of the Middle East, and/or future king.

Of course it was also part of his suicidal game. Personally I believe that he was never honest about reforms, democracy or humanitarian progress in Turkey. Let’s come back to the Kurdish question. If he is honest and willing to have a peace process, he will order a halt to the operations executed by the military in Kurdistan. If he is a man of peace, he will cut the extensive budget of the military and police forces, with their ridiculous expenses provided by the state. If he is honest, he will not seek to control the judicial system, he will not control the media and he will not arrest Kurdish politicians, journalists or oppositionists. If he is talking about equality, he will make the rich upper class pay more taxes and help the poor people of Turkey. If he is an honest, religious man he will not promote or cooperate with the global billionaire, racist and fake sect Fettullah Gulen movement.

But he is not honest, as we learn every day. We know that the PKK is not the cause of the problem. Almost a century of occupation, massacres and pogroms against Kurdistan is the cause. The denial of extra-judical killings, mass immigration, burnt villages and the extermination of Kurdish culture and economy is the cause.

If we look at the criminal cases against military leaders such as Ergenekon, Susurluk, Balyoz etc. the result is astonishing. Why? Because these people were arrested for reasons completely unrelated to their crimes in Kurdistan. The main reason was because they were opponents of Erdogan’s false Islamic Empire. Or it was because the secular fascist/nationalists had become a danger for the Turco-Islamic false empire of the AKP. So the people truly believed Mr Erdogan about positive changes and reforms. At the beginning, while the government started to arrest high-ranking military officers, the democratic organizations and western countries believed that he was totally honest about Turkish democracy.

Unfortunately, everything he has done is part of his political gamble for the future. I say it is a political gamble because it is not sincerely meant for the best future of Turkey and a democratic Kurdistan.  In his extremely dangerous game, if we assemble the pieces of the mosaic, we can clearly see why he put people in jail or court, including the organized crime case of Ergenekon and others. It is clear that his main interest is not about democracy: it is all about securing his absolute power. Because, as the famous Turkish writer Gun Zileli said in an article recently:  “Erdogan has arrested Turkish nationalists first, then he started with Kurdish nationalists and now the time is coming for liberals and others”.

So what is the main reason for arresting military personnel? There are clear reasons why he is against the Turkish military. First, the military has political and also economic power over the country. They still control billion-dollar contracts and income. The military is a kind of competitor to the government. So the purpose is not about democracy but about power. In his political gamble, he wants less a military and more a police state. Also, if we look at popular cases like Ergenekon or Balyoz, these people have not been charged with their ultimate crimes against the Kurdish people. There are hundreds of mass graves in Kurdistan since the war began with the PKK.  But Mr Erdogan and Mr  Gul are not interested in revealing the deeper roots of their crimes.

Second, the Turkish military is certainly one of the main abusers of human rights and it is guilty of many crimes against the minorities in Turkey. But – whatever we think of it – the military is also secular and not in favor of Islamic or Sharia rule in Turkey. The Turkish military is more secular than the government. But there is another reality about the structure of the Turkish state. Neither the military nor the government fully believe in democracy and human rights. While the police forces have closer links to Islamic groups and oppose the religious minorities such as Christians, Jews or Alevis, the military has more secular concerns about preserving its power and wealth.

The government and military have now eliminated the Kurdish question from their agenda. They probably held secret talks after the long battle between the secular military and the Islamic AKP government. Let’s imagine it this way. Possibly the military said: “We will not oppose your Islamic agenda, but we have one condition – no more reforms for the  Kurds”. So the Islamic AKP and the secular military decided to marry and, once again, they celebrated their marriage against Kurdistan.  As well as the Kurds, the Alevis, Christians and Jews also feel less safe. Unfortunately, I am not hopeful about Mr Erdogan’s radical changes.

Ahmet Abidin Ozbek was born in Ankara, Turkey and resides in Florida, USA. He is Kurdish and Alevi, has a Masters Degree in rural planning, agriculture and ecology from Turkey and Spain and was an active member of the Student Associations. He writes for www.sercavan.com and has written for the Kurdistan Observer and www.nasname.com He is also a freelance photographer and is writing a novel.