Sex, lies and videotapes

Lest we should gloat, similar problems await politicians here in Turkey. As an expat and a non-citizen of Turkey I, like most of my co-expats, have no right to vote in the general elections of June 12 but still observe with keen interest what is going on as political developments here do affect our lives. As the election campaigns of the various political parties progress, we can note that there are four front runners among the 20 or so political parties in Turkey. In poll position is the incumbent Justice and Development Party (AKP) led by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Charismatic and a superb orator, he makes a good speech and packs quite a political punch even though he can be belligerent and is infamous for his intolerance of criticism. Be that as it may, polls consistently predict that he and his party will win the election, possibly by a landslide of up to 50 percent of the national vote and secure him and his party an unprecedented third term in office.

As usual, there is the constant cavalcade of buses and minivans passing up and down the streets blaring out music or extracts of the respective leader's speeches. Streets are festooned with flags and bunting advertising various different political parties. But there doesn't seem to be much fervor among the everyday folk. Many seem resigned to the fact that the AKP will win and that it will be business as usual. This is known as voter fatigue and it could prove to be a problem.

More to the point, the two biggest challengers to the AKP, the Republican People's Party (CHP) and the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), are both in trouble. The almost certainly illegal release on the Internet of videos featuring a number of MHP candidates in flagrante has caused the resignation of 10 prospective MHP candidates to date. The goal of those behind the publication of these videos is, apparently, the resignation of MHP leader Devlet Bahçeli. I don't know why and it is not my place to speculate, but the whole sordid episode suggests that a new low has emerged in political campaigning in Turkey. We have been here before with the dethroning of former CHP leader Deniz Baykal after the publication of a video that caught him allegedly having a sexual relationship with another party member. Hollywood could not come up with a better script than the one we are seeing in Turkish politics today!

The fourth contender, the Peace and Democracy Party (BDP), is overtly pro-Kurdish and thought to be the political voice of what is internationally regarded as a terrorist organization, the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). More confusingly, there is talk in the press of some kind of electoral agreement between, on the one hand, the CHP and the MHP or, bizarrely, the CHP and the BDP! Turkish politics has long been considered “Byzantine” after the complex and often duplicitous empire was finally superseded by the conquering Ottomans in 1453. By all accounts, this election is getting down and dirty. The prime minister has accused CHP leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu of lying. Bahçeli looks and sounds like a Very Angry Man, accusing the AKP of orchestrating the sex-video scandal, but does not seem to have any coherent program for government. Disconcerting for those who favor the main opposition CHP, Kılıçdaroğlu seems to be promising everything and nothing depending upon his audience: Autonomy, in the mainly Kurdish Southeast; money for poor families; and so on and so forth. Erdoğan has already ridiculed him for saying one thing in the morning and the opposite in the evening.

‘Election campaign losing innocence'

Even Turkish political pundits remain perplexed. Unlike in the UK, political leaders campaign here mainly through mass meetings, which might make good TV, but preaching to the converted is an increasingly futile exercise. Indeed, Zaman columnist Fehmi Koru wrote: “There is a need to change the way and style election campaigns are held. As a country, we are a developing democracy and the form of election campaigns is gradually losing its innocence. Ugliness, filth, deceit and deception continue at full speed in the campaign process and are making politics dirty.” Add in the recent confession of respected newspaper and TV journalist Mehmet Ali Birand (whose Kanal D news program I actually enjoy watching) in Posta and the Hürriyet Daily News, respectively, that “mainstream” journalists had knowingly been pawns in the Turkish army's attempts to control political events continues to cause reverberations across the Turkish media. How are we expats supposed to make any sense of all this?

The AKP is fronting its campaign on massive infrastructure projects, especially for İstanbul and Ankara. The supposedly social democratic CHP is trying to convince electors with a number of social welfare programs with no indication of where the money will come from to pay for it. The MHP doesn't seem to have any coherent program and seems to be imploding under the sex-video scandals. The BDP is boosting Kurdish morale but again does not seem to have any concrete proposals for government. Of the Democratic Left Party (DSP), not a word! Nor, for that matter from any of the other political formations in the country, so it comes down to a three-horse race with no one doubting the eventual outcome.

While the AKP's roller-coaster seems inevitable, some projects are serious cause for concern: the third bridge across the Bosporus will be an ecological nightmare and should not be proceeded with; the “crazy project” to build a canal and two new cities in İstanbul province need to be seriously reviewed as there are no environmental impact studies yet available. Talk is cheap but the political and social impacts of massive infrastructure projects will be expensive, not merely financially, but socially and environmentally. The CHP's promises to dole out money to poor families is almost as ludicrous as former Prime Minister Tansu Çiller's infamous “two keys” promise (one for a house, the other for a car). Politicians should take a reality check. Turkey's economy is buoyant but some day it will rain and hopes will be dashed. This campaign seems to be all about sex, lies and videotapes. One would have hoped for something more dignified in an advancing democracy. As for excitement, Fenerbahçe's spectacular championship win had thousands on the streets in celebration. It also happens to be Erdoğan's team of choice. A portent?