Which is the greater crime: Criticizing the government or declaring war on the Republic?!

For exactly 10 days, the government and its media have been relentlessly attacking TÜSİAD.

Their crime?

During their General Assembly meeting, they painted a picture of the “new Turkey”—from democracy to the disasters experienced in the country, from the judiciary to the economy—stating, “As a country, our morale is low. We are experiencing a crisis of confidence... [The reason for this] is a collapsing system.”

Not even before he had stepped down from the podium, but one day later, an investigation was launched against High Advisory Council President Ömer Aras on charges of “attempting to influence a fair trial” and “publicly disseminating false information.”

Along with this, the government’s eyebrows were raised, and the pens of the media turned into cannons.

They started with “Turkey is not the old Turkey” and ended with “remnants of tutelage”...

They touched upon “interference with the national will” and arrived at “you are issuing a memorandum to the government”...

They laid out TÜSİAD’s “dirty past” and requested that prosecutors “put on the handcuffs”...

Erdoğan spoke four days later. As soon as he spoke, an investigation was launched against TÜSİAD Board Chairman Orhan Turan, in addition to Ömer Aras, and both individuals were made available to the Prosecutor's Office under police “escort”!..

In the end, it was decided that they had “committed the crime of publicly disseminating misleading information, in a manner suitable for disrupting public peace, regarding Turkey's internal and external security, public order, and general health, solely for the purpose of creating anxiety, fear, or panic among the public,” and they were released with a travel ban.

Let us look at Erdoğan’s reaction.

Stating that it was his government that “realized the phenomenon of a Turkey that speaks... raised the standards of our democracy, ended pressures, and lifted bans,” he put TÜSİAD in its “place” with words like “provocation... Old Turkey... The noble will of the nation,” and issued the call: “If you are so eager to engage in politics, either you form a party or you choose one of the opposition parties that look to the few words coming out of your mouth.”

So, it seems that in the “new Turkey,” engaging in politics has become the sole right of political parties!..

Yesterday, at his party’s 8th Ordinary Grand Congress, Erdoğan declared TÜSİAD “chaos barons” and said, “There is no room for informal politics in the New Turkey.”

Describing the “Old Turkey” by saying, “The national will was stolen with the coup mechanics operated every 10 years... They condemned and forced us for years to a third-class democracy and a third-class economy,” he emphasized that “those who are hostile to the AK Party have been waiting for the AK Party to weaken since August 14, 2001, and that they will continue to keep them waiting.”

PROMISES FROM 24 YEARS AGO

Based on these words of Erdoğan, let us recall the promises made in the party program prepared at the founding of the AKP regarding “Democracy, law-justice, civil society, and media,” and consider what class of democracy we have reached during their tenure.

That program, presented with the expressions, “The most important aspect is that it does not include rhetoric that cannot be turned into action. Our people know best that our words and our essence are one. With God’s help, everything will be better with us,” was summarized as follows:

- “Freedom of thought and expression will be built on the basis of international standards, thoughts will be able to be expressed freely, and differences will be seen as a richness.”

- “Bans and penalties imposed on the freedom of expression of the media, which are incompatible with the requirements of a democratic social order, will be lifted. The freedoms of print and visual media will be meticulously protected, and no opportunity will be given for monopolization... The definition of concepts such as censorship will be determined by civil initiative without leaving any room for doubt, and measures will also be taken outside of political will.”

- “The principle regarding the binding nature of the Constitution and laws on everyone will be meticulously applied... Judicial impartiality and judicial independence will be fully ensured, and judicial guarantees will be protected.”

- “The competition of different preferences is one of the indispensable elements of a healthy democratic system. Those who receive the majority of votes in this race come to power and assume the responsibility of the entire country or local administrations. However, winning the race and coming to power does not make the will of the majority absolute.”

- “The right of citizens to participate in public decision-making mechanisms indicates that the democratic regime is not a one-way regime, and that there is a two-way interaction between the rulers and the ruled. In this respect, the right to participation means not only that citizens vote in elections, but also that the ways to contribute to the making, implementation, and supervision of decisions related to the public are open.”

- “A state that does not impose, insist, or distribute rent; but a state that regulates, supervises, creates opportunities, encourages, and guides is a requirement of the dominant democratic understanding of the twenty-first century. This is what will bring our country to the place it deserves on the world stage... The AK Party is not a party that imposes ideology or distributes rent, and it will not be.”

''I HAVE PUBLIC SUPPORT BEHIND ME, STEP ASIDE''

Devlet Bahçeli, the leader of the MHP, a partner of the People's Alliance, also attacked TÜSİAD from his sickbed, saying, “The pains of tutelage have recurred... TÜSİAD’s transformation into an umbrella organization for operations to overthrow the government, or at least to wear it down; furthermore, to pave the way for the opposition, is a lawless, anti-democratic, and immoral deviation.”

On this occasion, let us also recall the comment Bahçeli made about Erdoğan’s “national will” rhetoric during the period when he was in opposition to the AKP.

He said;

“Mr. Prime Minister, who has seen parliamentary immunity as a protective shield to hide behind until today, is now trying to take refuge behind the shield of national will for the same purpose. The Prime Minister, who says, ‘I have public support behind me, step aside,’ is asking for a blank check to ignore the limits of legitimacy and do whatever he wants, and is claiming that this is his right.”

Finally, as seen in the TÜSİAD example, isn't this exactly the point we have reached?

THE DIYARBAKIR SILENCE

Two days after TÜSİAD’s General Assembly, something else happened in this country.

HÜDA-PAR, one of the partners of the People's Alliance, organized a workshop in Diyarbakır titled “A Human Solution to the Kurdish Issue.”

In the declaration published at the end of the meeting, where photos of Republic enemies Seyit Rıza, Sheikh Said, and Saidi Kürdi were hung and many AKP members attended, the following suggestions were made for the “solution of the hundred-year-old Kurdish issue”:

“The existence of Kurds and the Kurdish language should be under constitutional guarantee, and all obstacles to education in the mother tongue should be removed... The coup constitution, which is a product of the Kemalist mentality, should be changed, and a new constitution should be prepared on the basis of equal citizenship... The definition that everyone who is bound to the Republic of Turkey by the bond of citizenship is Turkish should be abandoned... An apology should be made on behalf of the state for the persecutions committed to date, especially those against Kurdish scholars.”

These delusions were nothing less than a declaration of war against the Republic of Turkey.

But you saw it; there was no sound from those who beat TÜSİAD relentlessly, nor did the public prosecutors lift a finger.

It seems that criticizing the government is a greater crime than wanting the Republic to be destroyed!..

If we don't count the fact that one of the Palace’s Chief Advisors, Mehmet Uçum, called the workshop “treason,” we understand the AKP’s silence, but what should we make of the MHP not saying a single word?!

Müyesser YILDIZ

February 24, 2025