Today’s Zaman, Turkey
Dec 31 2008
Tough challenges call for bold action in 2009
The Justice and Development Party (AK Party) has had its share of
difficult times in government since it first came to power in 2002,
but it may have to face the most critical tests of its six-year tenure
in the year that is about to begin.
Turkey’s bid to become a member of the European Union, a heartfelt
commitment for the government until around two years ago, faces a
major stumbling block over Cyprus and the EU’s growing impatience over
the stalled reform process. The government of Prime Minister Recep
Tayyip ErdoÄ?an, by far the most reformist government of Turkey
in the past few decades, has built its reformist agenda mainly on the
goal of EU membership. It has said several times that Turkey will go
ahead with reforms even without the objective of EU membership, but
the marked decrease in the intensity of reforms over the past two
years is obvious — even to the remotest observers.
The EU issued a loud and clear warning in November that it was high
time to focus again on the stalled reform efforts after two years of
distraction amid fierce fighting between the AK Party government and
the secularist state establishment. The EU deadline will expire at the
end of March, when local elections are due to take place in Turkey. A
further slackening in reform efforts after the first quarter of the
year could well mean irreversible damage to the EU membership
process. A fresh drive for reform does not, as the government now
appears to believe, mean new packages of measures to help Turkish law
adjust to European norms, mostly in technical fields.
Turkey’s friends in the EU, a number which is shrinking by the day,
expect Ankara to restore its supporters’ confidence by taking
undisputedly bold and radical steps in the political field and a
credible shift in the government’s increasingly pro-status quo
rhetoric, rather than cosmetic changes in technical and bureaucratic
areas.
2009 may be a make-or-break year with the EU for another reason as
well: Cyprus. In a solid warning, the EU suspended accession talks
with Turkey over eight chapters due to Turkey’s refusal to open its
ports and airports to traffic from Greek Cyprus, and said it would
review the situation once again in 2009. The government is calm,
saying it did not expect any major hurdles over Cyprus, but Turkey’s
opponents within the EU — perhaps the biggest group within the
27-nation bloc — are likely to seize the opportunity and press for a
halt if Turkey continues to keep its ports and airports closed to
traffic from EU-member Greek Cyprus despite pressure from Brussels to
open them.
One growing concern is that no matter how strongly it rejects the
idea, the Turkish government may be steering Turkey towards a
`privileged partnership,’ that opponents to Turkey’s EU membership in
the EU are promoting. The concern is based on the fact that the
government is increasingly shying away from democratic reforms at home
that the EU says are at the heart of the membership bid of any
country, while boosting Turkey’s appeal for the EU as a foreign policy
partner by undertaking successful efforts to expand its influence in
the troubled Middle East and Caucasus.
President Abdullah Gül’s courageous visit to Yerevan to watch a
football game between the national teams of the two countries in
September was obviously a step that proved Turkey’s readiness to
undertake bold initiatives for peace, but 2009 will be a period when
this manifest readiness will be put to the test. Failure will not only
mean a collapse in the rapprochement with Armenia but also may have
serious repercussions its relations with the United States, which has
just elected a Democratic administration that has openly committed
itself to recognizing the Armenian `genocide.’
Threshold in Kurdish issue
Another litmus test where inaction could spell danger is the Kurdish
problem, both at home and in regard to the newly instigated period of
dialogue with Iraqi Kurds. Prime Minister ErdoÄ?an has upped the
ante in a fierce competition with the pro-Kurdish Democratic Society
Party (DTP) for Kurdish votes in southeastern Anatolia with a visit to
the region in autumn that was widely protested in violent
demonstrations by DTP supporters. He poured petrol onto the fire when
he said those who do not accept that this is a `one-nation, one-flag
country’ should leave and he defended `a citizen’s right to
self-defense’ in the face of violent demonstrations by DTP supporters
in the Southeast and elsewhere in Turkey.
The run up to the local elections in March will truly demonstrate if
ErdoÄ?an will stick to his fiery rhetoric in bid to marginalize
the DTP or soften his line in search for a tension-free election.
Analysts say ErdoÄ?an may wish to pressure the DTP, hoping that
it will become a small party supported by a marginal radical group
with just a few percent of the vote, as his government has initiated
dialogue with Iraqi Kurds who run the northern Iraqi administration in
an effort to fight the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). Many,
including a top state prosecutor seeking the DTP’s closure, believe
that the PKK has links with the DTP. Iraqi Kurdish leader Massoud
Barzani is believed to enjoy widespread sympathy among Turkey’s Kurds
and the DTP may well be alienated if Barzani starts acting in concert
with Turkey, ErdoÄ?an’s advisors believe. Others are worried
that ErdoÄ?an’s furious rhetoric against the DTP will alienate
not only DTP supporters but also the wider Kurdish community in
Turkey.
As tension has escalated with the DTP on the one hand, the government
is trying to win Kurdish support by pledging economic development and
launching Turkey’s first state television station broadcasting in
Kurdish as of Jan. 1, 2009. The election results will be a major
indication of whether the government’s `attack-the-DTP-woo-the-Kurds’
strategy will bring it Kurdish votes.
The government will also have to decide what to do with growing calls
from Iraqi Kurds for an amnesty for PKK members as a way to eliminate
the PKK threat. ErdoÄ?an and other officials have declined to
openly dismiss a prospect of an amnesty amid reports that Turkey and
the Iraqi Kurds are working on a plan to get rid of the PKK, which may
also include an amnesty. But any amnesty is certain to be an unpopular
move in a country where tens of thousands of people have died as a
result of PKK terrorism and will be met with fierce resistance from
the nationalist opposition.
Fears of populism
2008 drew to a close amid an economic downturn in global markets that
has also begun to take its toll on Turkish businesses. The fact that
the March elections are looming on the horizon leaves the government
with yet another difficult decision on whether to stick to fiscal
discipline in order to protect the national economy from the adverse
impacts of the global crisis or to increase spending ahead of the
polls particularly in the Southeast to win big against the DTP.
The government will have to make some tough decisions in domestic and
foreign policy amid a global financial crisis that will force Turkey
to tighten its belt and come to terms with a growth rate that will be
far below the average for the past few years. Increased spending could
mean sweeteners for a population that is most likely to continue
facing crises and traumatic shifts in the year to come, but failure to
manage the economic crisis could be simply devastating.
31 December 2008, Wednesday
FATMA DEMÄ°RELLÄ° Ä°STANBUL