An even stronger Erdogan

Uniting his countrymen, women will be a formidable challenge, but he is by far the most successful Turkish politician.

Turkey has a new president. Recep Tayyip Erdogan was sworn in on August 28, becoming the first Turkish president to be elected by popular vote. He had served three terms as prime minister and has said that he will arrogate greater power to the office, which had hitherto been entirely ceremonial. He was voted to the post by a slim majority and today he leads a deeply polarised country. Uniting his countrymen and women will be a formidable challenge, but he is by far the most successful politician in the modern era in Turkey. His many critics say that his extension of presidential powers will only make him more authoritarian — and he already has a well-founded reputation as an authoritarian ruler. Members of the opposition parties walked out of the inauguration in protest, a less-than-promising start to the healing process. As he took the presidential oath he vowed to protect Turkish ‘independence and integrity, to honour the constitution and adhere to the principles of the founder of modern Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.’

It is those secular principles on which Ataturk reshaped the country that many in the Opposition see as being threatened by what they see as Islamist leanings by Erdogan. He is not popular with many of his European neighbours and no Western European country sent a head of state to the Erdogan inauguration, and the US sent a low-ranking representative from its Ankara embassy — seen by some as a snub. As the ceremony concluded, the police were using water cannon to disperse protesters in Istanbul. Polarised Turkey may be politically, but there is no doubt that under Erdogan, the economy has been rejuvenated and Turkey has moved from a ‘hands off’ position in respect of foreign policy to playing an active part in events surrounding the Arab Spring. Mr Erdogan has the solid support of the conservative middle class that are the most obvious beneficiaries of his years as prime minister, but it is the 48 per cent of the Turkish people that did not vote for him that form the mountain he has yet to climb.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 3^rd, 2014.

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