 |
Former military chief on the defensive over e-memo criticism
“In the statement, it was the second time I uttered the word ‘presidential election.’ I only said the presidential election process had turned into a [debate] over secularism and anti-secularism. How on earth would that be termed a memorandum?” the former military chief asked the Milliyet daily on Tuesday.
The General Staff posted the statement on its Web site only minutes before midnight on April 27, 2007. The statement was widely termed a military memorandum due to its harsh tone. It threatened action if the government did not do more to preserve the republic’s secular tradition. In 2009, Gen. Büyükanıt said he was the author of the controversial statement.
The April 27 e-memorandum was written in the form and style of the memorandum of March 12, 1971. Its concluding passages targeted the government -- though more skittishly -- and demanded political changes. After the “cases of reactionaryism” were listed, it openly interfered with the presidential election and threatened that the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) would be spurred into action to protect the values of the republic if the government failed to do so.
The e-memorandum came at a time when the Constitutional Court was hearing a case that would determine the outcome of the presidential elections, sparking criticism that the General Staff was interfering with the judiciary.
“I listen to, read and am saddened by criticism about the April 27 [statement]. It is continuously brought to the agenda. Some say it was TSK interference in the presidential election process. However, that was not the case,” Gen. Büyükanıt told Milliyet.
According to the former military chief, he mentioned the presidential election process twice in his life. “The first came during a speech I delivered on April 12, 2007 at the General Staff headquarters. In response to a question, I expressed my hope that the new president would be loyal to the principles of the Turkish Republic enshrined in the Constitution in heart, not just in words. I added that the authority [to elect the president] lies in the hands of Parliament. That was what I said. Is it possible to say the contrary? No,” he said.
Gen. Büyükanıt also said critics of the April 27 statement have either not seen an example of a military memorandum or have not read what is included in the statement. “There are examples of military memoranda in our history. Those who say the April 27 statement is a memorandum either do not know what a memorandum is or have not read the statement. That was not a memorandum. It did not interfere in the presidential election process. It just voiced the TSK’s sensitivity on secularism. It was not anything else,” he remarked.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| AMANDA PAUL |  |
||
| Ukraine: a lost country | |||
| MÜMTAZER TÜRKÖNE |  |
||
| The 52nd anniversary of May 27 | |||
| ABDULLAH BOZKURT |  |
||
| Turkey and Mexico: Distant yet so close | |||
| BERİL DEDEOĞLU |  |
||
| Yemen and beyond | |||
| ARZU KAYA URANLI |  |
||
| On Memorial Day a few words to make your day memorable | |||
| ABDÜLHAMİT BİLİCİ |  |
||
| Google kidnaps Gül! | |||
| CUMALİ ÖNAL |  |
||
| Critical months for Egypt | |||
| DOĞU ERGİL |  |
||
| Qualities of power | |||
| İHSAN YILMAZ |  |
||
| The Egyptian elections, Islam and Islamists | |||
| EMRE USLU |  |
||
| Operational errors | |||
| MARKAR ESAYAN |  |
||
| There is need for a new initiative | |||
| JOOST LAGENDIJK |  |
||
| Europe can’t have it all. Or can it? | |||
| HASAN KANBOLAT |  |
||
| Are Russian tourists being discouraged from visiting Turkey? | |||
| MELİH ARAT |  |
||
| Handmade | |||
| KLAUS JURGENS |  |
||
| Back to the ’80s | |||
|
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
