Can: Parliament must protect Constitution from high court

The Constitutional Court last week accepted a petition filed by the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) against the government’s amendment package, passed in May. The court’s first session on the package will be held on July 5.

The court has said it will review the appeal on procedural grounds. The court’s decision on the package, which includes articles that would reform the judiciary, is crucial for Turkey. Liberal jurists in the country say a ruling from the high court that cancels the public vote on the referendum scheduled for Sept. 12 would severely damage Turkey’s democratization process. Although the high court has said the review will be conducted on solely procedural grounds, it has still decided to conduct its examination based on substance in cases where it had initially promised a procedural review.

Rapporteur Osman Can said in remarks published in the Taraf daily that it was Parliament’s duty to protect the Constitution. Can also denied the veracity of news stories appearing in some media outlets that the court has threatened to fire him if he fails to retract certain statements he has made in connection with the case.

The Hürriyet daily had on Saturday claimed that the Constitutional Court was uneasy about Can’s remarks that the government should go ahead and hold the referendum even if the court rules to annul one or more of the articles in the reform package it is currently deliberating as per the CHP’s appeal. Other Doğan Group newspapers, including Milliyet, ran similar stories.

Can, who is also the co-chairman of an organization of liberal jurists called the Democratic Judiciary, said that “nobody has sent any kind of notification to me until now” in remarks published in yesterday’s Star daily. He further added that such a warning could only be issued to him by the court’s president, Haşim Kılıç. “No such thing has happened. It is not as if I will stick myself to the seat if they tell me to leave. I’ll say goodbye and leave,” Can said.

In the statement that triggered the controversy, Can had said that the government should ignore the court’s ruling if it annuls one or more articles in the package and take the package to referendum anyway. In its Saturday headline, Hürriyet had announced that Can would be dismissed from his position if he refused to retract his statement encouraging noncompliance with the court’s verdict. Some observers had interpreted this as an ultimatum issued to Can using a newspaper headline as a means and as a method for the high court to express its unease -- indirectly -- about the rapporteur’s words.

Speaking to Star yesterday, Can, who denied that he had been warned in any way, said that only Kılıç could tell him to “correct [his statement] or leave,” adding: “If there is such a case [at hand], they should notify me in writing. Plus, pointing to the rules of the Constitution and reminding of them an antidemocratic attitude? Is it wrong to criticize the court for a mistake it is likely to make?”

Can also said that if required, he would leave his post and go back to university for further academic studies. Meanwhile, Yusuf Şevki Hakyemez, a professor of constitutional law, issued a statement saying the original statement allegedly uttered by an unnamed member of the court as published in Hürriyet did not sound like someone from the high court had said it. The text printed in Hürriyet read, “The high court’s annulment or approval decision will be made objectively and be based on [a] meticulous assessment.” Hakyemez said it was unlikely that a member of the Constitutional Court spoke those words. “The Constitutional Court either annuls a bill or rules against an appeal to annul it at the end of an application. It is not the party to ‘approve’ of a bill. That is the Parliament,” Hakyemez noted.

Can’s liberal interpretation of the laws often angers some circles. In the past, Hürriyet ran a story in which it alleged that Can’s spouse, Gülnur Can, had been given a disciplinary punishment as a university student. In response to such stories, Can had retorted: “We are amidst a public struggle. It is saddening that even the press think to use such a personal issue as a newsworthy story.”