The long-suffering people in Turkey can see a ray of hope in the outcome of the local elections. For the first time in years, the authoritarian President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has been rebuffed by the voters. Erdogan’s AKP party (law and justice party) has lost control of the capital, Ankara, and also lost the mayor’s election in Istanbul. Erdogan’s defeat has significance far beyond its boundaries.
Having virtually walked away from the western alliance, Turkey now openly sups with the most powerful Russian dictator. Not long ago keen to join the European Union, Erdogan’s growing ties with Russia have further unsettled the situation in the entire Islamic world. Though formally still a secular nation, the Turkish Republic has reneged on the original constitutional values enshrined by its founder Mustafa Kemal Atarurk.
While paying lip service to the founder, Erdogan has allowed the Islamists an increasing role in the matters of state. He has co-opted Muslim clergy into the ruling party, clamping down with an iron hand against the Opposition parties, public intellectuals, free press and others who may not toe his statist line. Last year he sought and won more powers for himself in a referendum in which the opposition was virtually sidelined.
He is assured of power till 2023. But his defeat in the key local elections, especially in Istanbul and Ankara, is bound to erode his authority. After he veered away from the western alliance and wooed Putin, the flow of funds from various multilateral institutions has reduced to a trickle.
In fact, under the US-led sanctions, Turkish economy has slid sharply. The currency has lost over twenty per cent value against the US dollar, inflation has been in double digits for quite some time while Erdogan seeks to divert attention by playing the Islamist card.
Notably, Erdogan’s party used the video footage of the recent attack on a mosque in New Zealand to whip up passions but to no avail. The influx of Syrian refugees coupled with the reemergence of trouble in the border region with the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party and a section of armed Kurds seeking independence have added further to Erdogan’s woes. He might play the Islamist card but he is virtually a persona non grata in most Arab capitals.
Of course, Putin is in no position to offer him an economic life-line, though armaments aplenty is no problem. The UN and other aid agencies fund the relief and rehabilitation efforts for the Syrian refugees within the Turkish borders but until Syria gets back on its feet there is little likelihood of the millions returning home.
In other words, if Erdogan were to read the message of the voters in big cities correctly, it is to return to the path of secularism and nationalism without inserting religion into the governance of the country. Freeing dissidents, allowing the opposition to operate freely, lifting clamps on the media and restoring civil liberties and reassuring old western allies of his good intentions can still change the course of Turkey under Erdogan. Otherwise, the slide into economic chaos and a greater social and political mess would continue unabated.
