The Prime Minister's great mistake

Consequently, since he was ultimately unable to elect the President, it is easy and possible to conclude that the Prime Minister mismanaged the election process. Precisely because it is easy, it is a very seductive thought.

Evaluated from the beginning, the resulting outcome is a failure both for Erdoğan and for the government. Yet this is such a failure that for others to find in it a right, justification, or nerve to criticize, they must also adhere to no moral standards whatsoever. This is because this failure was the result of a non-political, and therefore immoral, intervention in the democratic election process. When judged by the established rules within the game of politics, such an outcome was impossible. Therefore, assuming a normal course of political events, no mistake was made in the process.

However, the Prime Minister's biggest mistake was his overly naive trust in democracy, the Constitution, and legal institutions. You may take this not merely as irony. Indeed, as someone who has gone through every stage of politics in Turkey, the Prime Minister's past experiences would have been expected to grant him sufficient foresight to anticipate the potential mishaps of the legal process.

It is blatant that the President is working not as the President of all Turkey, but merely of the CHP. In none of his actions so far has he acted impartially. He has made all his appointments with the sole purpose of placing CHP cadres, disregarding any metric, convention, standard, or qualification rule. Against every action of the government, he has mounted the opposition that the CHP failed to mount in parliament. While all matters falling under his "domain of sovereignty" were operated like a minefield for the government, it should have been taken into account that any issue referred to the Constitutional Court, regardless of its content, would result in an outcome against them.

Now, let us rewind the film and review a few points once again.

1. It is very easy to say today, but had the government announced anyone other than the troika of the AK Party prior to April 24, it could never have explained this to its own base. This is an obvious fact for anyone who knows the pulse of the AK Party base. Had Vecdi Gönül been chosen in particular, it could have been regarded as a certainty that the AK Party would suffer a major loss of votes. Abdullah Gül was not chosen merely because his wife wears a headscarf. The massive wave of public sympathy generated instantly across Turkey in favor of both him and the Prime Minister upon his announcement demonstrated just how spot-on a choice it was. Any other name announced in his place would have produced the exact opposite effect.

2. The AK Party could not have gone to an early election prior to the presidential election without encountering and demonstrating the deadlock in this matter. Had it done so, it could not have explained it to the public either. This was not stubbornness, as claimed, but a necessity. Now, despite having been unable to elect a president, it has at least not lost voter support; on the contrary, it has increased it.

3. The AK Party could not have brought the presidency to a referendum before reaching this point either. Whatever anyone says, it would have been met with the same reaction from the electorate. The fact that these changes are being made under the pressure of the opposition is a stroke of great fortune. Otherwise, it would not have been possible for the AK Party alone to bring to the agenda and finalize these changes, which will be a major democratic achievement under any circumstances. Even if this process blocks until the election after this stage, at least the deadlock will have been demonstrated. Since the genie is already out of the bottle, this change will eventually come to pass.

4. The AK Party may have been victimized during the process, but it does not have the luxury of playing the victim. Contrary to popular belief, the public does not embrace just any victim; rather, it stands by the victim who is righteous, strong, fighting, and inspiring hope. The politics it displays in defending its rights—which has been criticized as "stubbornness"—serves not to capitalize on victimization, but on the contrary, to reveal automatically, without any need for propaganda, the contradictions, injustices, and ruthlessness of its opponents (the CHP, the President, and other institutions).

5. Attributing the AKP's emphasis on the "national will" during the presidential process to the pragmatic and opportunistic tradition of right-wing politics is also unfair. Of course, the national will does not mean everything. There are also constitutional institutions in a democracy. Why do those who incessantly harangue us today about the potential threat of a numerical majority to democracy not consider, with a bit of fairness, that this numerical majority in Turkey has never been given any importance in the face of those institutions they value so much? When has the democratic numerical majority in Turkey ever possessed the presence it deserved against the excessive dominance of bureaucratic authority, for it to now even be a problem?

Yet, we have a blatant problem of the "power elite." Saying "neither national-willism nor the power elite" against this elite is explicitly taking the side of the power elite. Just as the slogan "neither Sharia nor coup" (as Tanıl Bora so eloquently demonstrated in Birgün, May 2, 2007) was, in fact, precisely in favor of the coup.

Because in Turkey, the national will has never yet been a real possibility, even in its positive aspects.

Just as a possibility such as Sharia in Turkey is out of the question in our near or distant future, whereas the disaster of a coup is a reality we are actually living through...