Why Erdoğan is so intolerant
Perhaps, Prime Minister Erdoğan supposes he cleanses his soul to an extent by accusing others with words similar to the ones he faced in the past
Journalist Fikret Bila revealed last Friday that all images, information, and documentation regarding the Kurdistan Worker Party’s (PKK) activities on the border and the support it received in northern Iraq would be presented to the National Security Council (MGK). However, Prime Minister Tayyip Erdoğan accused “the person who leaked this information and the one who wrote it” of betraying their country.
Apparently, someone has leaked this information to accentuate the chief of general staff’s words during his visit to the United States, at a time when he said, “I will not meet with Barzani and Talabani,” a statement which was interpreted as his contradiction with the government.
This is indeed a crime and it is the prime minister’s right to show his reaction, and it is the job of chief of general staff to find and punish the person who leaked the information.
The prime minister also accuses the journalist who wrote the leaked information. And with high treason!
This is an illogical attitude and an indicator that the prime minister has not embraced democracy fully, or, to be more precise, that he interprets it according to his interests.
Anywhere in the world, a journalist who knows what will be discussed in an important organization like the MGK beforehand will make it into the news. This is his job. On the contrary, if he is informed about it beforehand and does not write about it, he will be not betraying his country, but neglecting his job.
Bila is left alone:
It would have been very desirable if the media reacted in unison to the unjust accusation the prime minister directed at Fikret Bila. Unfortunately, this did not happen.
Bila was left alone to defend himself.
It was apparent in his column yesterday how sad the unjust accusation has made him. However, he does not need to be so saddened as Erdoğan does this quite often. Erdoğan can even call those that have stood by him in his hardest days a “traitor” without any feelings of obligation to them.
A prime minister that has his cheek pet by a journalist on one hand. And a prime minister that calls any journalist, who writes something that does not suit him a “traitor” on the other… Why does he do it so often?
Well, people whose minds have not gained a tradition of rational discourse, when faced with situations that do not suit them, react in already-memorized clichés instead of explaining what is wrong.
The cruelty of the wronged:
However, there is also a feeling I define as “the cruelty of the wronged.”
Some people would like to inflict upon others the same feelings they have lived through in the past.
The prime minister has been accused with unjust words many times in the past. He knows well with what adjectives some of the journalist pursuing him today used to call him in the past. And I know the adjectives that the prime minister used to employ for them.
Perhaps, not having been able to erase what he has been through from his mind, Erdoğan supposes he cleanses his soul to an extent by accusing others with words similar to the ones he faced in the past.
Followers of this column know that I think, more than just being on the democratic right, it needs to become an established tradition for the prime minister to become the president. However, readers also know that I argue that the prime minister’s frame of mind is not suitable to satisfy the needs of this duty. This event is a case that supports my reasoning.
A candidate for an office which needs to embrace everyone cannot even stand the basic right of a journalist to make news from the information he receives.