A report by the Turkish pro-government think tank SETA confirms what the Turkish local elections in March indicated. There is a paradigm shift underway in Turkey. The ruling AKP (Justice and Development Party) ’s loss of support is mainly blamed on three things: a sense of injustice, the economic crisis, and President Erdogan. The recent brawl in the Turkish parliament is a good example. 

This is not the first time this has happened. For example, in May 2016, lawmakers exchanged blows over proposed constitutional changes that would give President Erdogan executive powers, and again in January 2017. In April, a referendum was held, which approved the amendments so Erdogan could be sworn in as executive president the following year. 

This occasion was an extraordinary session of the parliament, which, despite the summer recess, was called to discuss the situation of Can Atalay, a human rights lawyer who had been elected as deputy in last year’s general elections. The reason for the fracas can be traced back to the summer of 2013 when an environmental protest in Istanbul erupted against plans to demolish Gezi Park and build a shopping mall.

By the end of July, 3.5 million people across eighty of Turkey’s eighty-one provinces had demonstrated in solidarity. As PEN wrote, “a culture of protest and dissent had been established amongst a previously politically disenfranchised younger generation.”

The government’s response was heavy-handed. Over 5,000 demonstrators were arrested, with eleven dead and 8,163 injured. Erdogan, then prime minister, denounced the protestors as “looters.” However, a comprehensive report published by KONDA, a public opinion polling institute, found that the Gezi Park protesters were college students in their final years, recent college graduates, or young professionals. 

Confronted with widespread popular protest, Erdogan claimed “the interest rate lobby” was behind the protests and said that foreign media outlets, in particular, the BBC, were part of an international conspiracy to destabilize Turkey. 

Erdogan’s aide, Yigit Bulut, whom he later appointed as his chief economics advisor, even claimed foreign powers were trying to kill Erdogan through telekinesis.

However, following the attempted coup in July 2016, which Erdogan used to settle scores with political opponents and critics, civic leader Osman Kavala was arrested in October 2017 and held in pre-trial detention. Finally, in March 2019, Kavala and fifteen others were indicted for financing and organizing the mass protests over Gezi Park in an attempt to overthrow the government. 

In April 2022, Kavala was sentenced to life in prison without parole. The European Court of Human Rights has twice ruled for the immediate release of Kavala and the Kurdish leader, Selahattin Demirtas, who has been imprisoned since November 2016. Despite Turkey’s membership in the Council of Europe, Erdogan has stated that he considers these rulings “null and void” for Turkey. 

Now, following the brawl in the Turkish Parliament, Turkey has another cause célèbre, that of Can Atalay. In December 2022, Atalay was sentenced to eighteen years’ imprisonment for his role in the Gezi Park protests, and in September last year, Turkey’s Supreme Court of Appeals upheld the sentence. However, in the general elections held last year in May, Atalay was elected as a deputy for the Workers’ Party of Turkey (TIP). 

Consequently, Turkey’s Constitutional Court ruled that Atalay was accorded legislative immunity and returned his file to the criminal court, ordering a retrial. The Supreme Court of Appeals disagreed, and accordingly, Atalay’s parliamentary mandate was removed in January. On August 1, Turkey’s Constitutional Court ruled that the Turkish parliament’s decision to strip Atalay of his mandate was unlawful. 

Article 153 of the Turkish Constitution states that decisions of the Constitutional Court are final and binding. Nevertheless, Turkey’s Supreme Court of Appeals has stated that the Constitutional Court’s decision has no legal value.

As Özgür Özel, the leader of the opposition CHP (Republican People’s Party), tweeted on X: “This incompetent government has turned our country into a banana republic, which is not governed by law and the constitution is not recognized.”

When an extraordinary Parliamentary session was convened, fighting broke out when Ahmet Sik, a fellow deputy from TIP, said, “We’re not surprised that you call Can Atalay a terrorist, just as you do everyone who does not side with you. But the biggest terrorists are the ones sitting in these seats.”

Ultimately, it is not Can Atalay, Osman Kavala, or Selahattin Demirtas who are on trial. It is the rule of law and the separation of powers in Turkey that have been undermined since Erdogan became executive president in 2018. The AKP now has a majority in parliament, together with a nationalist (MHP) party and an Islamist party (YRP), but Erdogan prefers to rule by decree. 

Since 2016, more than 4,000 judges and prosecutors have been dismissed and replaced by AKP acolytes, which makes the prospect of justice even more remote. Already a top scorer, by December last year, Turkey accounted for a third of the caseload at the European Court of Human Rights, and in recent years, Turkey has refused to comply with a number of its rulings. 

The World Justice Project has, in its Rule of Law Index for 2023, ranked Turkey at 117th place (between Mexico and Guinea) out of 142 countries. 

Faced with rampant inflation, Erdogan has reinstated Mehmet Simsek as finance minister (he was replaced by Erdogan’s son-in-law in 2018), who has signaled a return to a “rational” economic policy.

As part of this process, Turkey’s Central Bank raised the interest rate to 50 percent in March, which has made Turkey dependent on “hot money” and the carry trade. This has resulted in an increase in Turkey’s foreign exchange reserves but not in long-term (direct) investment, which remains conspicuously absent. 

Ten years ago, Muharrem Yilmaz, the president of Turkey’s Business and Industry Association (TÜSIAD), warned: “A country where the rule of law is ignored, where the independence of regulatory institutions is tainted, where companies are pressured through tax penalties and other punishments, where rules on tenders are changed regularly, is not a fit country for foreign capital.” Erdoğan accused Yilmaz of treason, and he was forced to resign, but his warning should be heeded. 

Robert Ellis is a Turkey analyst and commentator. He is also an international advisor at RIEAS (Research Institute for European and American Studies) in Athens.

Image: Shutterstock.com.