IS THE AKP INDISPENSABLE?
ELDAR MAMEDOV

Hurriyet
March 23 2010
Turkey

For a long time, the ruling Islam-rooted Justice and Development
Party, or AKP, was presented in the West as the only Turkish party
fully committed to the EU accession process. This image of the AKP
as Turkey’s European champion is not only deceiving, but also harmful.

It is deceiving because the AKP’s commitment to Turkey’s EU membership
is doubtful. And it is harmful because it risks alienating those
numerous Turks who are pro-European, but oppose the AKP.

Since the initial wave of reforms in 2002-2005, the AKP has
failed to deliver on major issues, such as the adoption of a new
constitution befitting a country seeking EU membership. Instead of
using its overwhelming victory in 2007 elections to promote a broad
societal consensus to this end, it rushed through some ill-prepared
and self-serving reforms, such as the popularly elected president
and lifting the ban on headscarves in universities. This selective
approach to reforms has resulted in widespread suspicion that the
AKP merely uses the slogan of EU integration as a means to weaken its
adversaries, namely the staunchly secularist military and judiciary.

This is why even some necessary steps, like the law allowing trials of
military officers in civil courts, are met with cynicism by many. The
AKP’s consistent failure to reach out to the opposition in Parliament
and in society also explains its current difficulties with pushing
forward the judicial reform.

The government’s a la carte approach to liberalization is evident on
many issues that are crucial in terms of Turkey’s progress toward
the EU. For example, the government’s vaunted "Kurdish initiative"
has come to naught after it arrested on flimsy charges hundreds of
members of the now defunct pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party,
or DTP, including its democratically elected representatives.

Gender equality is one of the fundamental values of the EU. But in
terms of empowerment of women Turkey has suffered severe setbacks
since 2002. According to the U.N. Human Development Program report
released in October 2009, Turkey is ranked 101st out of 109 countries.

The percentage of women in government executive positions decreased
from the already low 15 percent in 1994 to 11 percent in 2009. Women
have only 0.42 percent of seats on municipal councils, and out
of Turkey’s 2,948 mayors, only 27 (0.9 percent) are women. For a
country that once had a female prime minister and minister for foreign
affairs this is a shame. But whenever the AKP and their supporters are
confronted with this situation, they usually point to the headscarf
ban as the "mother of all problems" of Turkish women, conveniently
forgetting that for many the headscarf itself is a symbol of female
submission. While the minister in charge finds time to criticize
"erotic scenes" on TV, the government does nothing to reverse downward
trends in women’s participation in public life.

Nor is it fighting other forms of inequality and discrimination. There
is still no government body responsible for equality and
non-discrimination, as required by the EU.

Another key area where the AKP government is failing to meet European
standards is in social rights. The failure to approve for many
years the trade unions’ law is a major impediment to the start of
negotiations with the EU on the social and employment chapter, a part
of the harmonization package. The government’s indifference to the
plight of the striking workers of the now privatized former alcohol and
tobacco monopoly known as Tekel illustrates its skewed understanding
of economic liberalism. In line with this is the government’s failure
to provide effective social protection in a country where 19 percent
live below the poverty line, and the number of those covered by social
security is merely 80 percent and decreasing.

In the field of foreign affairs the much vaunted "zero problems"
policy of the AKP is fast becoming "zero results" policy. The
rapprochement with Armenia has come to a halt, while the relations
with Azerbaijan have also been damaged in the process. The high
hopes of Turkey becoming the key actor in the South Caucasus are thus
fast diminishing. Although this is not entirely the fault of the AKP
government, there is no progress on Cyprus either. The improvement of
Turkeys relations with Syria and other Arab countries is welcome, but
it should not have come at the expense of Turkey’s ties with Israel.

The damage done to the relations with Israel undermines Turkey’s
ambitions to become a credible mediator in the Middle East conflict
and will be difficult to repair. Erdogan’s embrace of leaders like
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran and Omar al-Bashir of Sudan has fueled
further suspicions about a pro-Islamist turn in AKP’s foreign policy.

Most worrying of all is the Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s
alarmingly low tolerance of criticism. A huge fine imposed on the Dogan
Media Group for the supposed tax evasion was universally regarded
as politically motivated. The prime minister’s recent threats to
columnists who "create tension in the country" raise serious doubts
about whether he understands the notion of the freedom of speech
at all.

After almost eight years in power, the AKP looks increasingly tired,
intolerant and incapable of delivering on the EU track. It is now
a duty of the main opposition People’s Republican Party, or CHP,
and emerging forces, such as Mustafa Sarigul’s Movement for Change
in Turkey, to provide a serious alternative to the AKP while
reinvigorating the pro-EU agenda. This would be a healthy process.

Most importantly, it would reconnect with the European project those
Turks who are pro-European, but alienated by AKP policies. European
progressive parties have a role to play in order to help this process.

* Eldar Mamedov is a political adviser to the Socialists and
Democrats group in the European Parliament, but is writing in a
personal capacity.