The DP's congress will be marked by a historic face-off and showdown between the “secret hands” behind the military tutelage over Turkish politics and the “young Democrats” guarding the Menderes legacy. This isn't a race to power within the party. It is the symbolic struggle of those who are resisting a coup-oriented marginal right from seizing Menderes' party.The mastermind behind those trying to lay a siege on the DP is Süleyman Demirel, who will back Cindoruk as party leader in the party's congress. Having put a “wonderful” end to his political career on Feb. 28, 1997, Demirel has said, “If I wasn't a president in the past, I would intermix with them -- the delegates as well.”
Although having been a president in the past is no excuse not to enter the political field, the problem is that Demirel depleted all his authority while he was president. For new democrats, Demirel, who was president during the Feb. 28 coup, is as much their own leader as was Cemal Gürsel, who became president following the 1960 coup, for the old democrats.
The chief obstacle to Demirel's return to politics was his failure to represent the center right with his actions during the Feb. 28 process. Some naive and very smart journalists still refer to Demirel as the “natural leader of the center right.” If natural leadership were something true, no one would have been able to stop Demirel even after he was removed from power. Even now, if Demirel was the natural leader of the center, instead of chasing down delegates, he would have become more active in politics himself. But he knows very well that he didn't represent the center right on and after Feb. 28.
Even the generals who plotted the coup don't come out and defend Feb. 28. But the natural leader of the center right still defends the coup and the coup plotters. Is there any way the latter can become the leader of the DP? That would be funny.
There is no center right constituency that will embrace Demirel, who actively participated in the Feb. 28 process, provoked the military, defended the deep state and told girls wearing the headscarf to go to Saudi Arabia.
At best, Demirel will find a few people standing behind him during the singing of the “Onuncu Yıl March at Atatürkist Thought Association (ADD) conferences. He knows very well that he has very little support behind him, yet he is still trying to take over the DP. He could establish a new party; all he needs to do is find 30 people. So why the DP? Demirel says his heart does not allow him to see a political movement, which he led for so many years, die away. Yet he knows that he is the one that killed the movement. Those who defended the coup, undermined the national will and sang the “Onuncu Yıl March” to create psychological terror didn't just harm the center right, but they harmed themselves as well.
In reality, what his heart doesn't allow is having the DP return to its real mission and follow a democratic, liberal and anti-coup policy. This political attitude disturbs Demirel and Cindoruk because it makes them feel guilty. Perhaps partially this is the reason why they want to silence Süleyman Soylu and his team. However, the main reason for their struggle is that they want to take the center right under their control, emasculate it and offer its services to the deep state. Despite his “weight,” Demirel is concerned about defeat in the congress. He says they will continue on a different path if they do not win over the DP. Where might they go? If the DP delegates show the Demirel and Cindoruk couple the door, the two may seek refuge with the Republican People's Party (CHP). While the two have been deemed fit for CHP leadership, most likely the CHP won't even accept them as delegates. From now on they will only be ordinary CHP voters.
