Al-Ahram Weekly | Region | Dervis' choice

		15 - 21 August 2002 Issue No. 599 Region	Current issue Previous issue Site map
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Dervis' choice
The resignation of prominent Turkish Economy Minister Kamal Dervis from Ecevit's cabinet could weaken centre-left parties and benefit Islamists, Gareth Jenkins reports from Ankara

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Dervis(l) with his successor, Masum Turker, during a press conference this week
Turkish Economy Minister Kamal Dervis resigned from the government on Saturday to concentrate on trying to forge an alliance of secular parties in an attempt to prevent the Islamist Justice and Development Party (JDP) sweeping to power when the country holds early elections on 3 November this year.
After 23 years working at the World Bank in Washington, Dervis, 53, was recalled to Turkey by Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit at the end of February last year after the country had been plunged into its worst economic crisis in living memory. When he arrived in Turkey with his glamorous American wife, Dervis was hailed as a saviour and the local media began referring to him as a new John F Kennedy. But the enthusiasm soon began to fade as Dervis introduced a tough economic reform package, backed by over $16 billion in IMF loans. Within months Dervis was being widely portrayed in the media as an IMF-stooge or even an agent of US imperialism.
Undeterred, Dervis adopted a lower public profile and continued to work behind the scenes to ensure that the government fulfilled its commitments to the IMF. His apparent disregard for his personal popularity won Dervis respect not only internationally but also amongst the Turkish financial and business communities who, even if they did not like the policies Dervis was trying to implement, nevertheless saw him as a man of integrity; a quality rarely associated with a Turkish politician. By the beginning of this year Dervis's continued presence in the government had become a touchstone for stability. Just a rumour that he might be forced to resign was sufficient to send the financial markets into turmoil.
By April this year, there were signs that the Turkish economy was finally beginning to pull out of recession. But any hopes that Dervis may have entertained of being able to guide it through to full recovery were dashed in May when Ecevit fell ill. Ecevit's refusal to step down resulted last month in almost half of his Democratic Left Party (DLP) resigning to form a new party, the New Turkey Party (NTP) under former Foreign Minister Ismail Cem, removed the government's parliamentary majority and forced it to announce early elections in November.
Opinion polls suggest that the JDP, headed by the charismatic former mayor of Istanbul Tayyip Erdogan, will win around 25 per cent of the popular vote, while all of the main secularist parties will struggle to overcome the 10 per cent barrier necessary for representation in parliament.
As soon as the date for elections was formally announced Dervis began a series of meetings with the leaders of secularist parties in an attempt to persuade them to form an electoral alliance. Such efforts were regarded as treason by Ecevit, who had not only brought Dervis back from the US but, even though he is 79 years old and in failing health, still appears to believe that he can lead the DLP to power on its own in November. Over the last week, officials close to Ecevit repeatedly publicly insisted that Dervis could not expect to continue his contacts with other parties and remain in the cabinet.
On Saturday, when he announced his resignation, Dervis declared: "I will work for the creation of a choice on the centre-left that reflects modern social liberal theory and that could come to power on its own."
But few analysts expect him to succeed. There are currently 49 political parties in Turkey. Virtually all are built around a powerful individual who runs the party as a personal fiefdom. Many hold identical political views but attempts to unite ideologically similar parties have always foundered on the leaders' reluctance to share power, and the opportunity it provides to buy loyalty through distributing largesse, with anyone else.
On Sunday Dervis met with Cem and other leaders of the NTP in a clear indication of where his own political sympathies lie. But, although both Cem and Dervis are popular with the urban middle classes, they have failed to generate much enthusiasm amongst the vast numbers of urban and rural poor, who are still waiting for the signs of economic recovery on paper to be translated into improvements in their everyday lives. Privately, sources close to Dervis admit that he is aware that if he fails to forge an electoral alliance his joining a particular party, such as the NTP, will serve only to further fragment the centrist, secularist vote; and the only beneficiary will be the Islamist JDP.

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