He is best remembered for his efforts as minister of health when he tried to staunch the flow of generosity from the outside world when western Turkey was rocked by an earthquake in 1999. He announced that Turkey could deal with the problem itself, and when this proved not to be the case -- largely because of the scale of the disaster, but also because he had helped ruin the health service by stuffing it with party cronies -- he turned down help from Armenia and warned victims about accepting “tainted” blood from Greece. Among his other notable contributions to public life was the creation of a charitable foundation which allowed him to channel ministry funds free of inspection or auditing.Like the cardboard villain of a teenage horror series, Mr. Durmuş recently bounced back from the political graveyard. He bared his teeth and was openly sarcastic about the prime minister’s wife. He also accused Mr. Erdoğan of wearing his heart on his sleeve after the prime minister revealed that his wife was banned from paying a bedside visit of mercy to a prominent actor in a military hospital because of her headscarf. What right had anyone to deny entry to the wife of the prophet himself, Mr. Durmuş asked from his parliamentary perch. This resulted in fisticuffs on the assembly floor and the rumpus inside the press has not yet died down. Osman Durmuş justified his remarks by quoting a local party boss in Aydın from Mr. Erdoğan’s party who described his love and devotion to the prime minister as so great it is as if he were a latter-day prophet. The media which supports the government has been deeply outraged by the ex-minister’s effrontery to lampoon the sense of discrimination felt by those who keep their heads covered.
I think I have made it clear that I am not Mr. Durmuş’s greatest fan, but I am obliged to confess a sneaking admiration for the way he has introduced some much needed irreverence into Turkish political discourse. Of course, it is silly and just plain wrong that a woman wearing a headscarf should be denied entry to a hospital, just as it is frustrating and immoral that women who wear headscarves should be denied opportunity in their working lives. And I dare say the MHP, which will be trying to pick up disgruntled Justice and Development Party (AK Party) supporters, will be themselves annoyed over Mr. Durmuş latest display. On the other hand, it is also true that the prime minister’s wife enjoys a comfortable life and is attended by an army of secretaries and door openers and has every opportunity to make her own voice heard. If anyone is equipped to suffer jibes that they are taking the martyrdom of their own piety a bit too seriously, she is the one.
I am not advocating a wholesale rush to take up incivility. However, I do feel it is unfair that we are obliged to take politicians as earnestly as they take themselves. We all know about Article 301, which makes it an offense to insult Turkishness, the state and all its institutions. What we need is an Article 302, which makes it a criminal act to engage in excessive flattery. Suppose Mr. Durmuş had made his remarks not in Parliament but on YouTube, would it be correct to have access to the site banned? It would be unnecessary since YouTube is already banned in Turkey for harboring among its zillions of files a couple that contain slights about Atatürk. And if he had not been a deputy with parliamentary immunity, should he have been tried alongside the other offenders who were sentenced last March to a penal sentence for shouting “Light bulb Tayyip” at a demonstration in Bursa?
Mr. Erdoğan used his right of reply to accuse Osman Durmuş of behaving boorishly (“izansız”), and that is where the matter should have ended. The one I feel sorry for in all this is a local official from Aydın who inadvertently started the whole mess rolling. Mr. Erdoğan has asked for his resignation, and the unfortunate man has complied. He must be the first person in the history of the republic to lose his job for being over-sycophantic.
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