His reasoning was that if a person of whose innocence he was convinced could be accused of plotting to overthrow the state, then no one was immune from the dawn raid or the high-profile seizure of documents and computers. His fears are not unique. Those who have encouraged the Ergenekon prosecution are suddenly having to defend themselves. What started out as a process of rooting out a history of abuse of state power now risks being accused of being yet another example of that abuse. Ergenekon was meant to be synonymous with a conspiracy of violent provocations and dirty tricks, designed both to push the country into the arms of those who keep Turkey isolated from the rest of the world and to keep their own circle of power intact. The prosecution promised for one glorious moment to be shining a torch into all the darkened corners of recent Turkish history, to be calling to account those responsible for a series of seemingly mindless assassinations and other acts of violence. Last week, the prosecution went through the files of Türkan Saylan, an elderly chemotherapy patient with very fixed views on what it means to educate a new generation. It seemed that those prosecuting Ergenekon might be engaged in a conspiracy of their own aimed at discrediting their own case.
Placing my doctor informant on the political spectrum is not as easy as it sounds. Unlike me, he regards opening the border with Armenia as a concession that is being forced upon Turkey, just as he thinks Ankara is being made to eat humble pie on the question of Kurdish autonomy in northern Iraq. On the other hand he is no crude nationalist. He had volunteered as a young doctor to work in the Southeast of the country and had been willing to learn Kurdish to better treat his patients. "I am certainly not MHP [the right-wing Nationalist Movement Party] and I'm not even sure I'm CHP [the nationalist left-wing Republican People's Party]," he told me. I suppose what we share most in common is a critical view of the way all governments wield power, regardless of their ideological color.
He already believed, and in this he is again not the only one, that the current nationalist, conservative Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government threatens his way of life. The current wave of Ergenekon prosecutions, he believes, has become a way for them to show their teeth, a means to intimidate potential opposition, not to pursue justice. This view would be easier to dismiss if he were the sort of doctor who drove his SUV to the clinic to conduct liposuction on the great and the overfed. However, he spends his days in cramped conditions, attending to a steady stream of people on modest incomes. On the other hand, this engagement with ordinary people gives him a mild sense of entitlement, to be treated as a person who makes sacrifices and shows dedication and whose opinion, therefore, matters.
It is people like my friend the doctor that the prosecutor needs to keep on board. There is still much to hope for from the Ergenekon trial and much reason to regard it as part of the reform process with which Turkey should be engaged. And it is true that all reformers can make mistakes. I recall interviewing Kemal Derviş, the architect of Turkey's economic reform program in 2001. His conclusion from the experience of his colleagues who had conducted similar efforts in other countries was that it was as important to explain the program as it was to design it. If you are leading people through a painful process, it is necessary to hold their hand.
The government must understand that if Ergenekon-style machinations have created anything, it is a general suspicion of authority. This government, no more than previous governments, cannot escape fears that it is seeking power for selfish ends. Its job of appearing impartial isn't made any easier by its appearing to go after the one newspaper group whose spin it cannot control. While it seems improbable that Turkey will be split beyond repair, it is necessary to anticipate the danger that a trial which should be about reconciliation may lay the seeds of future bitterness. The urgent priority of the government should be to halt polarization and to promote healing.
