 |
Al-Ahram Weekly 16 - 22 March 2000 Issue No. 473 
|
||
Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
| ||
|
Al-Ahram Weekly 16 - 22 March 2000 Issue No. 473
|
||
| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
| ||
Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Special Focus Travel Living Sports Profile People Time Out Chronicles Erbakan on a razor's edge
By Gareth JenkinsOn Friday the Turkish State Security Court sentenced former Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan, the country's first avowedly Islamist premier, to one year in jail for allegedly inciting public hatred during a 1994 speech. If the sentence is upheld by the Court of Appeal, Erbakan will be banned from politics for life.
The ruling against Erbakan came shortly after courts sentenced last month 18 leading members of the pro-Kurdish People's Democracy Party (HADEP) to three years and nine months in jail, dashing hopes that the December 1999 announcement of Turkey's official candidacy for the European Union would lead to a relaxation in the country's often draconian restrictions on political heterogeneity.
Erbakan was convicted under Article 312 of the Turkish Criminal Code for allegedly inciting religious hatred in a speech he had made during a local election campaign in the south-eastern city of Bingol in February 1994 in which he attacked the mainstream political parties support of Turkey's application for EU membership. "They say they will abandon the Islamic community, join with the Christians and allow the infidels to make our laws and govern us," he declared. "We shall never become lackeys of the Christians. We shall establish an Islamic union."
Erbakan was already serving a five-year ban from politics following the closure of the Islamist Welfare Party (WP) in January 1998. A sprightly 73 year-old, he is still acknowledged even by his enemies to have one of the most agile brains in Turkish politics. It was an open secret that Erbakan remained very influential in the WP's successor, the Virtue Party (VP), and had ensured that the party was headed by a long-time confidante, Recai Kutan, in preparation for his own return to active politics.
Under Turkish law, if Erbakan's sentence is confirmed, he can expect to be released from jail after four months for good behaviour. But, as a convicted felon, he will be banned for life from political activity.
Police in Istanbul detained approximately 180 people gathering in a predominantly Kurdish neighbourhood on 12 March to take part in a demonstration commemorating the fifth anniversary of a clash with police that left 21 dead (photo: AP)
Erbakan remains confident. "I have no doubt that the sentence will be overturned on appeal," he said after the sentence was announced.
But some of his supporters were more outspoken. "This is a legal disgrace," said Bulent Arinc, the head of the VP deputies in parliament. "Article 312 is simply fascist. It should be abolished immediately."
The jail sentence put paid to any lingering hopes among his supporters that Erbakan might be able to participate in the May presidential elections. Under Turkish law the president is elected by parliament from amongst its members and can only serve a single seven-year term. The tripartite coalition government is currently trying to push through a constitutional amendment to allow the incumbent Suleyman Demirel a second term. Erbakan's supporters in the VP have been lobbying for a public vote and an amnesty for Erbakan to allow him to stand for the presidency.
But on Sunday Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit ruled out any immediate amendment to the law. "We need Article 312," he said. "It may be possible to change the wording, but certainly not until after the presidential elections."
Erbakan's jail sentence will also increase the tension between traditionalist and reformist wings of the VP in the run-up to the party's first ever national congress on May 14. Last month a leading reformist Abdullah Gul, 50, announced that he would challenge Kutan for the party leadership. In reality the contest looks set to become a battle by proxy between Erbakan's followers, who will back Kutan, and reformist supporters of former Istanbul mayor Tayyip Erdogan, who is currently also serving a life-long ban from politics after being sentenced last year to a 10-month prison term for violating Article 312.
"Abdullah Gul knows the realities of the situation," said one of the reformist deputies. "He has his own ambitions, but he is clever enough to realise that Erdogan is really the next leader of the party. Nobody can change that, neither Gul nor any ban on Erdogan."
Privately, some of the reformists have even welcomed Erbakan's jail sentence. "It is wrong, of course, because it is a violation of human rights and freedom of expression," said one Islamist businessman. "And we respect what Erbakan did in the past. But it is time for some new blood and the jail sentence will help us get rid of the old generation of politicians like Erbakan. But the hard-line secularists are also shooting themselves in the foot. We have more time than Erbakan and we won't be so easy to push around."
