Getting Turkey back on track

Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) has swept its opposition away and reclaimed a similar share of the votes as in their landslide 2011 victory, with nigh on half of the Turkish public supporting Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu’s political vision. After a disappointing performance last June that saw it win the elections but fail to secure the necessary number of seats to rule singlehandedly, the AKP is now seeking to steer Turkey into calmer waters and now have a clear mandate to deal more proactively with regional security issues.

Since the AKP came into power in 2002, Turkey has transformed into a country unrecognisable from any previous period since the foundation of the Turkish Republic in 1923. The Turkish economy, long recognised as an international joke, was resuscitated and revitalised. Turkey became a place not only to do business, with thriving textile and agricultural industries, but also a touristic hotspot. People from around the world flocked to visit the seaside resorts on the Turkish Riviera, the ancient underground city in Cappadocia, and of course the crown jewel and capital of the Ottoman Empire, Istanbul. The story of the AKP’s seemingly miraculous achievements in Turkey is well-known, and the above is a good glimpse into what Turkey has been missing since the Syrian civil war began and since domestic turmoil began started to steer the country off track in 2013.

Turkish citizens, perhaps weary of the Syrian refugee crisis, the faltering economy and allegations of corruption against senior AKP members, did not vote in the numbers that the AKP were expecting in the June 2015 elections, instead, fringe parties like the Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) with links to the terrorist Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) managed to enter parliament. Arguably, HDP’s entrance into the Turkish legislative assembly would not have been possible without the peace process started by AKP in 2013, thus signifying that Kurds were equal citizens to any Turk. Inexplicably, however, PKK (and by proxy HDP) renewed violence against the Turkish state after the so-called Islamic State (Daesh) bombed a Kurdish demonstration in Suruc. Rather than retaliating against Daesh directly, the PKK killed two Turkish police officers.

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It is in this climate of increased violence, chaos and instability that the Turkish public have come to decide, five months after the June elections, that only a single party government can steady the ship, with the AKP on the tiller. Although Davutoglu made many attempts to form a coalition government, the opposition parties, all of whom must now be feeling particularly crestfallen, rebuffed him. This is particularly the case for the far-right Turkish Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) whose leader, Devlet Bahceli, refused to enter into meaningful talks with the AKP citing the aforementioned peace process which his nationalist party opposes. Even with the breakdown of the peace process, rather than forming a coalition with the AKP and earning control over some ministries, MHP have now been cast into the political abyss, losing seats and barely making it over the ten per cent threshold required to enter parliament.

Although the AKP has 316 seats, it lacks the 330 required to call for a referendum to change the constitution and political system in Turkey to that of a presidential system. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s office is therefore still largely symbolic, although he undoubtedly wields considerable influence and control over the political course set by his AKP comrades. Erdogan and Davutoglu may look to attract defectors from the backbenches of the other parties, but this is a distinct unlikelihood as the political arena has become so polarised as to morph into almost “pro-Erdogan” and “anti-Erdogan” camps, with hatred of Erdogan being a common ground that connects the leaders of the opposition parties to some extent.

Instead of focusing on expanding the powers of the office of the president, the AKP will likely seek to remind the Turkish public why they elected them for 13 consecutive years. The first action it is likely to undertake is a redoubled effort to quash the movements and actions of terrorists and saboteurs domestically. This will include tougher action against PKK and Daesh terrorism, and cracking down even further on the “parallel state” outlawed Hizmet organisation of the US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen. Indeed, just before the elections, the Koza-Ipek media group (loyal to Gulen) was seized by an order from a Turkish court. Such actions will likely be escalated with the backing of the courts in order to deny Gulen the ability to interface with the Turkish public, and slowly but surely blot him out of politics, business and the media.

Regionally, the AKP is now secure for a further four years, which means that it has a window of opportunity to start applying increasing pressure to end the Syrian civil war on terms that favour it and its allies. Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad and his Iranian allies would have surely been disappointed with Turkey’s election results last night, as it means parties sympathetic to Al-Assad, like the Republican People’s Party (CHP) led by Kemal Kilicdaroglu, are unable to influence government policy vis a vis the Syrian crisis. Moreover, with four years ahead of it, the AKP can continue to build and expand its growing alliances with the rich Arab Gulf states of Qatar and Saudi Arabia, all of whom share a common interest in toppling the Ba’athist Assad regime. This could see a strengthening of economic and military ties, expanding already existing military agreements such as those already extant between Turkey and Qatar.

With the above in mind, the most important thing for the AKP is to make Turkish citizens understand that the Turkish economy cannot grow while Turkey’s neighbours are in turmoil and while those who fear any expression of religion start to align their interests with groups who hold racist nationalist ideologies. Whether they like it or not, Turkey is a largely stable country that exists in a highly unstable region, and they cannot simply ignore political events in Egypt, Syria, Iraq and beyond. Due to a number of historical, cultural and religious factors, Turkey’s fate is closely intertwined with that of its neighbours, and it is impossible to wash its hands of the region as the problems in the Middle East will continue to spill over onto its soil.

The AKP is now tasked with getting Turkey back on track, and that means dealing decisively with domestic and regional strategic imperatives. The Turkish people should be under no illusions that their prosperity can only continue if their neighbours find peace, and that, arguably, is the AKP’s greatest mission.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.