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Al-Ahram Weekly 29 Apr. - 5 May 1999 Issue No. 427 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 29 Apr. - 5 May 1999 Issue No. 427
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Profile Focus Special Travel Sports People Features Living Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters 'We just don't trust the Arabs'
By Gareth JenkinsOfficials from the nationalist-left Democratic Left Party (DSP) of caretaker Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit began exploratory informal negotiations with representatives of the ultra-nationalist National Movement Party (MHP) to form what observers describe as the clearest example of a nationalist government in Turkey's history. The talks follow a surge in support for the far right in the 18 April general elections.
Formal negotiations cannot begin until the election results are officially confirmed by the Turkish Supreme Electoral Board, which will probably take place at the beginning of May. However, unofficial results show the DSP as the leading party with 22.2 per cent of the votes and winning 136 seats in the 550-seat unicameral parliament. DSP was followed by MHP with 18.0 per cent (130 seats), the Islamist Virtue Party (FP) with 15.3 per cent (110 seats), the centre-right Motherland Party (MP) with 13.2 per cent (86 seats) and the conservative True Path Party (DYP) with 12.0 per cent (85 seats).
"We are open to suggestions from all parties without discrimination," said MHP Secretary-General Koray Aydin. "The arithmetic of the new parliament means that there are eight or nine possible coalition combinations."
But privately, leading MHP officials admit they expect to form a coalition with the DSP. "Ecevit has changed since the 1970s when he was a socialist. He is a lot more nationalistic now," said one high-ranking party official. "Some of our party members complain about the prospect of cooperating with a leftist, but Ecevit is not really a leftist any more. I think we can work with him."
But a DSP-MHP coalition would still be 10 seats short of a majority. Turkey's powerful, rigorously secularist military has already made it clear that it will not allow the Islamist FP, which it suspects of supporting the introduction of Shari'a law, to participate in a coalition government. While both Ecevit and the generals are known to doubt the reliability of DYP chairwoman and former Prime Minister Tansu Ciller, the MP of former Prime Minister Mesut Yilmaz is currently expected to join the government, giving the tripartite coalition 352 seats.
"We would be prepared to serve in a DSP-MHP-MP coalition," said a source close to Yilmaz. "But it is a dilemma. If the MHP doesn't participate in the coalition then it will probably increase its electoral support. If it does join the government then it will entrench its party supporters in the bureaucracy and it will take years to get them out again."
The electoral success of the MHP, which more than doubled its share of the vote from 8.2 per cent in the last elections held in 1995, has triggered a vigorous debate in the press about whether it is the MHP or Turkey which has changed. The mainstream press, which until the 18 April elections dismissed the MHP as riddled with right-wing terrorists and members of the Turkish underworld, is now suggesting that it is the MHP which has moved toward the centre of the political spectrum. The claims have been dismissed by MHP chairman Devlet Bahceli, who was elected to the leadership of the party in 1997 after almost 30 years in the party. "Of course, we haven't changed," he said. "It is Turkey which has changed."
Even his opponents admit that the 51-year-old committed bachelor is honest. "Bahceli comes from a very rich family and doesn't need to be corrupt," said one former high-ranking party member. "But he has surrounded himself with people who are. You only have to look at the police records to see how many of the leading members of the party have been involved in murder, drug smuggling and protection rackets."
For foreign governments, a more pressing concern is the impact that the MHP's possible participation in a coalition government will have on Turkey's foreign policy. "The success of the MHP in the elections has caught us completely flat-footed," admitted one Western diplomat. "We just don't know what to expect."
MHP sources insist that there will be no immediate radical changes in foreign policy if the party comes to power. "We have had enough of being told what to do by the European Union, particularly on the Kurdish question," said one high-ranking party source. "But initially we shall just let relations ride and make sure we don't do anything to strengthen relations with Europe rather than doing anything to actively weaken them. And eventually we shall just make our foreign policy according to Turkey's national interest rather than doing what Europe or NATO want us to do."
The MHP has long advocated closer ties between Turkey and the Turkic states of Central Asia, which MHP ideology claims to be the ancestral home of the original Turks. But party officials dismiss suggestions that a new foreign policy orientation might also include closer links with the Middle East. "We will continue defence cooperation with Israel for as long as it suits us. But I don't see us moving closer to the Arab states," said a party source. "We are not racist. We just don't trust the Arabs. We haven't forgotten how they betrayed the Ottoman Empire by siding with the Allies," he added.
