Erdogan’s Presidency and Turkey’s Regression

14:59     20 January, 2015

Turkey’s President Erdogan does not stop surprising. This time Erdogan has become the first President of the last 12 years, who chaired the cabinet meeting. This step of the President has caused the criticism of the opposition adding new arguments to the accusations directed towards Erdogan concerning authoritarianism and holding all the powers of the government in his hands, reports Euronews.

The Turkish Constitution gives right to the President to call a cabinet meeting and chair it, but the last time that such thing happened was during Suleyman Demirel’s years. The Presidents, prior to Erdogan, Ahmed Caesar and Abdullah Gül, have never chaired a cabinet meeting and have been limited to more ritual functions as it is envisaged for the President of Turkey. The opposition thinks that the expansion of the presidential powers by Erdogan moves Turkey away from the Western standards of rule of law and freedom of expression.

At the same time Tass informs that during the aforementioned meeting the cabinet has discussed issues concerning national security and economic development, as well as questions concerning terrorism and fight against “parallel structure” of the Gülen movement. This information was given by Deputy Prime Minister Bülent Arınç. Concerning the AKP’s fight against “parallel structures”, Arınç said that the government will not be “tolerant” towards this question. The Deputy Prime Minister also said that the next cabinet meeting will not be chaired by Erdogan, and such meetings “will not have a permanent nature”.

Besides, the Turkish government has threatened to block Twitter, because it refuses to close the page of the opposition newspaper, reports Sky News. The court in Adana has prohibited the information agencies and newspapers to cover and comment any news concerning the delivery of the humanitarian assistance to Syria.  As Газета.ру reports, the local media has stressed that vehicles with weapons have headed to Syria to help in the fight against the governmental powers, though the Turkish authorities refuse these news. According to them these vehicles have taken humanitarian assistance for the peaceful people of Syria.