Erdogan still has his eye on one more prize

Two disconcerting indicators for the future of Turkish democracy have flown under the radar in the week since Sunday's surprising parliamentary election outcome. The first came within three days of the AK Party's striking victory, when president Recep Tayyip Erdogan was quick to the trigger to broach – again – the idea of putting in place a presidential system of governance.

“Turkey’s need to solve the issue of a new constitution was one of the most important messages of [the] November 1st [election]. The nation is waiting for this,” he insisted. Earlier the same day, a presidential aide said a referendum to make the necessary constitutional changes should be considered despite the fact that no such vote can legally take place as the AK Party failed to win the additional 13 seats required to do so.

Kurdish fighters killed

The second cause for concern arose on Thursday when the Turkish military killed 16 Kurdish fighters of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), raising the five-day post-election toll to 35 rebels killed, a significant number even by recent events.

Most observers expected that since the AK Party achieved its primary objective – winning back its parliamentary majority and thus its position to form its own government – it would ease up on stoking Kurdish anger in southeast Turkey.

In a country that is no stranger to violence and political instability in recent months these two incidents are perhaps unsurprising and of little cause for consideration. But they should be.

The degree to which the AK Party wrested back control of Turkish politics last weekend confounded analysts, pollsters and voting citizens. In the aftermath, some (including the international currency markets) thought that, with the AK Party’s parliamentary majority returned and the Kurdish-aligned Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) keeping its parliamentary presence, the country could expect a quieter outlook.

Instead, Erdogan said he would prompt prime minister Ahmet Davutoglu to meet with opposition parties to discuss changing the country's constitution and should no consensus emerge – the likely outcome since all oppose the president's meddling in parliamentary affairs – he would go to the public to decide on his dream.

The fact that Erdogan belongs to no party, and as president constitutionally holds little political power, has failed to quell his thirst for control. In his view, becoming the first directly elected president of the republic in 2014, and winning 51 per cent of the vote along the way, the people of Turkey want him to lead. The president has been criticised for his seemingly neo-Ottoman inclinations and for building a massive, 1,000-room presidential palace in Ankara.

However, a poll of 1,614 Turks a day after the election found that almost twice as many preferred maintaining Turkey’s parliamentary system of governance to the number who favoured the executive presidential version Erdogan craves.

Long-time Turkey watchers say the number of personalities willing to question and take on Erdogan in policymaking debates has evaporated since 2007. At its creation in the early 2000s, the AK Party was the vision of Erdogan, former president Abdullah Gul, Bulent Arinc and others who sought to establish a political party that functioned for and represented practising Muslims in Turkey. At that time they were individuals who had coalesced around an idea, an ideology, not an individual.

Since 2007 and the AK Party government’s purging of the once-domineering military, a siege mentality seems to have pervaded Erdogan’s thinking. In the years since, the authorities have brought to heel the judiciary and the police forces by firing thousands of officials and officers, silencing independent media often by simply taking over and rebranding outlets to fit their world view and, most recently, playing the terrorism card by exacerbating a war with the PKK that has led to over 2,500 deaths since July.

The return to war in Turkey offered the AK Party an excuse to accuse the HDP of having links to terrorists during the election campaign. What followed was the massacre of 102 peace activists – including HDP supporters – in central Ankara on October 10th. “We held no campaign. We simply tried to save our people from massacres,” HDP co-chair Selahattin Dermitas lamented in the aftermath of Sunday’s election.

It is impossible to tell whether Prime Minister Davutoglu’s election victory comments to “lift Turkey out of all kinds of polarisation, conflict and tension” and that “from now on, Turkey should leave bitter arguments behind and focus on its future goals”, can be taken at face value or are part of a broader political ruse to smokescreen Turks and the international community into a false sense of security while the ambitions of the president come to pass.

The president and AK Party’s stance over the past five months, however, suggest the latter may be the case given a similar speech was delivered when the party lost its majority in June.

Significant leverage

With the right direction, Turkey finds itself with several strong cards to play. Its position linking Syria with the EU and its ability and willingness to absorb millions of Syrian refugees means it has significant leverage over Europe.

Its young population and ability to attract international tourists of all stripes keeps the economy ticking over.

On the politics front, had the Kurdish-focused HDP won three-quarters of one percent less in Sunday’s election, Erdogan would by now be well on his way to legally ruling Turkey, the tremors of which would have been felt across the Middle East and Europe. Instead if given a chance the HDP’s colourful and diverse group of parliamentarians will make a welcome addition to pluralistic politics in Turkey.

But the fact that the AK Party won five million more votes on Sunday compared to June suggests not only that Turks see it as a stabilising force, but that its leaders’ rhetoric of fear and division has worked. Today a course of action is in place that has divided a country and ruined the advances that once held Turkey aloft as a successful example of Islamic democracy to the world. Altering that course is in the hands of a single man, but a man who seems hell-bent on bringing down a country to build his empire.

Stephen Starr reports from Turkey for The Irish Times. He is the author of Revolt in Syria: Eye-Witness to the Uprising (Hurst: 2015). stephenstarr.info