To win Koç's heart

The December 17 process continues at full speed, displaying every characteristic of a coup attempt. In this process, despite all its official statements to the contrary, the Community has assumed all the responsibilities of the coup through all its media organizations and official representatives. It tries, in spite of everything, to give the impression that all the events are unfolding on their own within a routine legal procedure. But at this point no one is so mentally retarded as to get stuck on the corruption dimension of the affair. Even if Community spokesmen try to pull things into the field of symbolism produced by the December 17 operation, the shoe box, the gift watch, the money safes in the house, these discourses find their place only as hostile cheering, as crowd noise. In fact, this performance increasingly causes a greater mass concern about the Community's intention, its goal, and its capacity to organize toward that end.

Meanwhile, it would be no exaggeration to say that Fethullah Gülen's speech tapes that have leaked onto the internet have had an effect determining the course of events. Undoubtedly, dwelling on these tapes is ethically problematic because the audio recording was made by unlawful means. That is why, on the evening of the day the recording leaked, on the program I appeared in on Kanal 24, together with Yaşar Taşkın Koç, Mustafa Kartoğlu and Hatem Ete, we made an ethical decision and did not dwell on these tapes until the end of the program. But the next day, as a result of the objection by the Journalists and Writers Foundation to the sound having been recorded by illegal means, we found ourselves faced with the fact that it had confirmed the content of the recording.

GYV confirms the content of the tapes, but while objecting to the making of this recording, it argues that there is no criminal element whatsoever in its content and says that it is perfectly normal for a scholar to do such things.

Since it has been confirmed by GYV, which is in the position of Gülen's official spokesman himself, we can now talk about the content of the tapes.

I think GYV is deciding on its own and far too early whether there is a criminal element. Besides, even if there were no criminal element, there is a series of moral problems for which they will never be able to account ethically. Perhaps for many scholars it might be possible to be part of this kind of conversation, but if one takes as a basis the portrait of Gülen drawn for us until now, either the Gülen in those tapes is not him, or Gülen has nothing to do with the portrait drawn until now, of a reclusive, tolerant scholar focused on his worship, with no income other than his book writing.

Because what emerges is an entirely different portrait: one who distributes tenders to businessmen he wants, decides what columnists writing in his newspapers will write, interferes with the writings of those writing in other newspapers, can make bureaucrats within the state who are attached to him do things against the state's interests, can steer the money traffic of banks, harms the state by informing the business world loyal to him of the state's tax inspections, and thus is exactly one who "openly takes the right of the orphan," and it becomes clear that what has been told until now was, to put it mildly, a lie. Moreover, it presents an entirely different picture of the background of the whole corruption rhetoric that has been worked up for a month with the December 17 operation.

It is clearly seen in these recordings that the path of the heart of this portrait does not pass through the path of the hearts of the believers, the oppressed, the ummah. He cares about winning Koç's heart, but does not mind that this costs the blocking of the paths to the hearts of all other believers, oppressed and rightful people.

What, I wonder, is the cost to this country, to this nation's orphans, of the gestures made to be able to enter those hearts through "our men" in certain institutions? There is an open confession there of advance warning of the financial irregularities that an inspection coming to Koç might find, or, even if no warning was given, of problems being cleared irregularly by the men inside.

It is seen, from both the tapes and other news, that Gülen is also brushing aside with the back of his hand the initiatives of Gülerce, who has stood out since the beginning of the events with his conciliatory character, and in fact of others as well. He continues to defy the government.

For a person, a party or an organization to defy the government is of course not an abnormal situation. But what the Community relies on when defying is no secret. It is no secret to anyone now that what it leans on is the security forces, which are hierarchically subordinate to the government, and the structure within the judiciary, which by its nature must be independent not only of the government but of every kind of influence. It is understood that in this defiant attitude it sees the judiciary as subordinate to itself and trusts that it can make it do what it wants, and is thereby threatening the government. Indeed, after every word he says, someone from within the police or the judiciary acts in a synchronized manner.

In fact, in this way it becomes even more nakedly clear that the December 17 process does not consist merely of a fight against corruption. That is why no one finds it strange that the government is giving a political response before a legal one to this besieging of politics.

If any formation can defy the government in this way by relying on a group subordinate to it in the judiciary, then neither the impartiality nor the independence of that judiciary can be spoken of at all. There can be no more natural reaction for the government, as a political actor, than to take the measure that will restore the rule of law, that is, its independence and impartiality.