Where was President Sezer all this time?
If in the end the AKP comes out of these elections as strong as it did before, if not stronger, it is clear that this will be the by-product of the negative roles played by President Sezer, Mr. Baykal and the Turkish Military.
The President of the Republic in Turkey is an important person who has powers to play an important proactive role in times of crisis. This has happened in the past. Given what is going on in the country it is clear that there is the need for a “deus ex machina” to unravel the increasingly complex political mess that we are in; a mess that has been heightened by the military’s “late night ultimatum” of last Friday.This is why one is totally justified in asking where President Ahmet Necdet Sezer was as the present crisis in Turkey was brewing and what kind of a role he played to diffuse it. The question becomes even more valid after we saw him mediate between the “battling brothers” Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan and Hamit Karzai of Afghanistan earlier this week.
Why just Musharraf and Karzai?
His joy at playing the role of “conciliator” was there for all to behold. But it also led many to questions why he is not playing such a role in terms of domestic politics. What makes the question even more relevant is the fact that this has hardly been a “foreign policy President” to date, and instead has been one that has concentrated more on domestic policy issues.The simple answer to the question being posed here is that President Sezer did not play a proactive role in diffusing the crisis that has emerged in the search for his successor. He could very easily have brought together the “battling brothers” Prime Minister Erdoğan, and Deniz Baykal, the bellicose leader of the main opposition Republican Peoples Party (CHP).He could easily have invited them to the Presidential Palace and exhorted them to leave their personal bickering to one side and think of the Republic instead, since the President to be elected by Parliament will be representing the Republic, and hence will be the President of the People, and not the President of this party or that.Sezer chose, however, not to play this role and no doubt history will note this when accounts of the present crisis are being written in the future. If anything President Sezer will be noted for the “reactive” role he played through which he contributed to the present turmoil rather than helping to solve it and diffuse the tension that has emerged.His address to War Academy students shortly before his tenure was due to end in fact made short shrift of any positive role he may have played. Especially when he went out of his way in that address to invoke an exaggeration he did not bother to express during the whole of his presidency and claimed that the secular regime in Turkey was facing its greatest threat to date.
Fuelling the fire:
It was clear that he was referring to the prospect of Prime Minister Erdoğan’s becoming President here, as was being speculated at that time. By uttering these remarks Sezer not only showed a lack of respect for the democratic process in this country, since it has always been the case that the strongest party in Parliament has put up the candidate for President in the past, but also made himself a party to the dispute. In other words he did away with any prospect of playing an impartial and proactive role that could have helped a smooth transition to the next Presidency. In addition to this his remarks put him very much in the camp of the military which has not shied from interfering in politics in a manner that has tarnished Turkey’s reputation abroad.But much more importantly, he has buttered the bread of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and has enhanced its chances of winning the up coming general elections by making this party appear as the only one in the political sphere that has respect for the democratic process. If in the end the AKP comes out of these elections as strong as it did before, if not stronger, it is clear that this will be the by-product of the negative roles played by President Sezer, Mr. Baykal and the Turkish Military. They will in effect have carried the very “Islamists” they dread so much to power again with their own hands, rather than letting them be weakened, if not defeated, as a result of the natural loss of support that comes for any party in a democratic society after it has been in power for some time.