It is sometimes quite relieving to be in full conformity with a hard-to-agree-with prime minister.

- 11 / 05 / 2008 14:11

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, speaking to Newsweek (May 4, 2008), said: “In the West the AKP is always portrayed as being ‘rooted in religion.' This is not true. The AKP is not a party just for religiously observant people – we are the party of the average Turk… Turkey, with its democracy, is a source of inspiration to the rest of the Islamic world.”

Two false arguments, and one absolutely right – that the AKP is the party of the average Turk. It is sometimes quite relieving to be in full conformity with a hard-to-agree-with prime minister. Yes, with over 16 million votes, the AKP is the party of the average Turk.

About two years ago, this column argued that: “The average AKP politician is the mirror image of the average Turkish voter: Devoutly Muslim but pragmatist, anti-western in genes but pro-EU in anticipation of economic/political benefits, collectivist in theory but individualist in practice, and moralist when ‘the other' goes corrupt but tolerant when ‘we' go.” (Why AKP is the mirror image of the average voter, TDN, March 29, 2006).

Meet the average Turk:

Having happily agreed with Mr. Erdoğan that his party is the party of the average Turk, we may be curious to know the ‘average Turk.' Is he the mustachioed, chain-smoker who beats his wife as often depicted in Western cartoons? The same man who walks in the street a few paces ahead of his chador-wearing wives? The one whom an increasing number of European Union citizens do not want to see living in their countries? The angry man who is overtly anti-American and covertly anti-Semitic?

Is he the man who is prepared to die or kill in the name of his country or his religion? Is he the man whose country ranks 64th in the global corruption index or 84th in the human development index? Is he the man who hates military coups but each time there is one takes the front line to applaud a cortege of generals? Is he one of over 16 million “enlightened” people who, according to Mr. Erdoğan, make the sacred “will of the nation?” A small drop in a sea of “enlightened” people who are “enlightened” because they voted for the AKP? Is he “enlightened” when it comes to electing MPs only, but so “unenlightened” when it comes to other political matters?

Why does Mr. Erdoğan not put important political matters to national vote since “this nation is so much enlightened?” He can always start by asking the Turkish voter whether Abdullah Ocalan should be hanged. Or whether Turkey should cooperate with the United States over Iraq (or over Iran).

Other referendum ideas may include whether the northern third of Cyprus should be annexed to Turkey; whether all Christian missionaries in Turkey be jailed; whether Turkey should permanently invade northern Iraq; whether the government should broaden religious freedoms for non-Muslim minorities; whether insulting ‘Turkishness' should be illegalized; whether Turkey should send troops to defend Azerbaijan against Armenia; whether the ‘strategic partnership' with Israel should be scrapped; or whether parliamentary immunities should be removed.

Of course these referendum ideas can be multiplied endlessly. But it is certain that Mr. Erdoğan's ‘average Turk' or his ‘enlightened nation' will in each case give him the right policy guideline in the shape of the ‘will of the nation.' In the prime minister's own words, “why should one run away from the nation's will?”

So much as Mr. Erdoğan was right that his party is the party of the average Turk, he was misleading in his assertion that the AKP is not an Islamic-rooted party. Having left behind a number of political parties now defunct because of Islamism, a political career based on Islamic militancy and, further, heading a political party that faces a court ban for the same reason why his former parties were closed down, Mr Erdoğan is hardly convincing, especially when he himself labels his party as a grouping of “Muslim democrats,” instead of just “democrats.” If the AKP is not an “Islamic-rooted” party then DTP is not pro-Kurdish or the CHP is not archaically Kemalist or the MHP is not nationalist, and the military has never staged coups in Turkey.

Mr. Erdoğan's other claim that “Turkey, with its democracy, is a source of inspiration to the rest of the Islamic world,” is equally rhetorical and reflects his survival instincts as he very well knows that reminding his western friends of his “face value” could maximize their support for him during these very difficult times. Mr. Erdoğan has been very successfully selling his party's presumed face value to a naive but willing western market of buyers. The market is still there, as lucrative for Mr. Erdoğan as always, but it would be wrong for him to assume he could sell the same “product” to the same buyers forever – as there are signs of “consumer saturation.”

That is to say, some of his best western friends are beginning to ask themselves more realistic questions. For example, with six years in power, to which Muslim nation has Turkey been a source of democratic inspiration? Do the Shia in Lebanon look to the AKP with envy and begin to distance themselves from Hizballah? Do the Mullahs in Iran get inspired by the Turkish “Muslim democracy” and abandon their nuclear ambitions? Does the Assad dynasty in Syria begin to look westwards and towards democracy because its members are “inspired” by Mr Erdoğan?

How about the balance of power in Palestinian territories between Hamas and al-Fatah? Any inspiration from the Turkish role model? Are the Gulf states marching towards pluralism and free elections with the Turkish model shining in their north? Have Egypt and Saudi Arabia inched closer to any faintest idea of democracy on inspiration from the party that is the party of the average Turk?

When will the Muslim states begin to feel inspired by Turkey's democracy? Will they ever? When at any point in history has anyone seen Arab nations getting democratically inspired by any Turkish model?

Sadly, the last time Turkey “inspired” democracy in its region was when it invaded northern Cyprus, a move which did not only end the time of coups in Cyprus but also led to the collapse of the junta in Athens.