A pall of anxiety has settled over Anatolia, reinforced by the two percussion bombs that went off in Istanbul last week only hours after the Ankara Security Directorate's anti-terrorist unit announced the arrest of three persons on the outskirts of the capital connected with Al-Qaeda and suspected to be planning a terrorist attack in the city centre. At the same time, from his abode of voluntary exile in Pennsylvania, Fethullah Gülen, the Islamist preacher who revealed the information that triggered the corruption probes that are haunting the Justice and Development Party (JDP) government, announced that he would be holding a meeting soon to discuss steps to take in response against the escalation in JDP leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan's vitriol against Gülen. Naturally, Gülen's announcement can not be seen in isolation from reports appearing in Turkish and international dailies to the effect the officials high up in Washington are growing uncomfortable with Erdogan and believe that his time in power is approaching an end. And so it would appear from the train of collective resignations from the JDP, as occurred in Diyarbakir and Adana in south-eastern Anatolia in protest at Erdogan's policies. Oddly, however, contrary to the observation on the part of many observers that these are rocky times for Erdogan, some of his close associates argue that he is stronger and more secure than ever. Could this have anything to do with the systematic “purges” of the police and judiciary? Certainly, since 17 December, when the scandal broke that set the wheels of the judiciary in motion, with probes into allegations of fraud, money laundering, embezzlement, etc, the JDP government has sustained its relentless war against all involved in aiding and abetting these legal processes. These would include members of the police, charged with such tasks as carrying out warrants and raids. Four days ago, more than 160 policemen were dismissed from the force in Bursa. The following day, around 600 more were eliminated from the police forces in Ankara, Istanbul and Izmir. The campaign also targeted more than 100 judges and public prosecutors from various cities. According to figures cited in the local press, some 2,500 policemen have been penalised in one way or another since mid-December. As though the situation in Turkey were not tense enough as is, tomorrow — Friday — parliament is set to vote, “in principle”, on a bill that has stirred widespread anger at home and EU criticism abroad because, if passed, it will severely undermine the autonomy of the Turkish judiciary. But RTE (Erdogan, as he is known) appears unruffled. He even let slide that outburst in Brussels during a summit meeting of the 28 EU members when Bruno Wagnes of the ultra right Flams Plang Party lashed out against Foreign Minister Didier Reynders for having allowed a tyrant such as Erdogan to set foot on Belgian territory. But then RTE has other fish to fry abroad. They go by the name “accursed foreign agendas”, “the conspiracy of the empire of fear” and that evil mastermind Fehullah Gülen whose dastardly schemes are being carried out in Turkey by that philanthropic movement that he founded and that RTE variously refers to as a “criminal organisation” or a “mafia”. Since the Turkish political discourse is heavier than usual with “conspiracy” talk these days, as the Erdogan-Gülen conflict escalated whole arsenals of “plotting and treason” charges, and damning “proofs and evidence”, were rolled out. So it should come as no surprise that the whole of the newly reshuffled Turkish cabinet would stand up as one behind their prime minister in the face of the “17 December conspiracy against Turkey”. Equally to be expected, the pro-government Sabah newspaper stepped forward with the “astounding details”. This took the form of recordings of Gülen's telephone conversations with highly placed officials, confirming that he and his organisation had infiltrated certain government apparatuses. But the elderly sheikh was not to be outdone. Suddenly the waves of Soundcloud were abuzz with recordings of telephone conversations between Erdogan and his daughter, Emine, regarding a choice property deal on the sunny shores of the Mediterranean coastal town of Antalya. If one had already wondered about eavesdropping warrants in the case of the “Gülen tapes”, one was even more inclined to wonder about the likelihood of bugs planted in the prime minister's home and office. While some might ridicule the JDP's “conspiracy” rhetoric, political scientist Cengiz Eker of Sabanci University in Istanbul holds that conspiracy theories circulate widely in Turkish society and have a powerful influence. In all closed societies, the rumour mill prevails because there is a perpetual lack of information, he said. The well-known journalist and columnist Hassan Cemal offers a historical take on Erdogan's latest conspiracy rhetoric. He writes that just as the “communist conspiracy” that circulated during the Cold War served as the pretext for Ahmet Kenan Evren's military coup in 1980, and just as the “Islamist conspiracy” served to unseat the elected prime minister Necmettin Erbakan in the “white coup” of February 1996, so too do JDP conspiracy charges levelled against Gülen and his society threaten to undermine democracy in Turkey. These charges are, quite simply, untrue, Cemal continues. Erdogan and his clique are fabricating them in order to divert public attention from the volcano of corruption charges that erupted around them when news surfaced about unscrupulous behaviour on the part of some of their associates that resulted in the squandering of millions of dollars of public funds. Regardless of the salvoes of “charges” and “evidence” from this side or that, there is a fierce political war in progress and it threatens to divide the conservative Muslim majority in the country, if it already hasn't. This was the majority that had long been the JDP's and Erdogan's bastion of support. That it is fracturing so vividly bodes ill for the prospects of Erdogan and his party in the municipal elections that are around the corner in late March and the presidential elections in August, and suggests that a new political map in Turkey is in the offing. In another episode in Turkey's unfolding political crisis, the JDP and its leader came under fire from the business sector, traditionally grounded in Kemalist secularism and instinctively opposed to ruling party's Islamist orientation. Last week, Muharrem Yilmaz, chairman of the Turkish Industry and Business Association (TÜSIAD), issued a stern warning to the government. Foreign investment would not continue to flow into a country in which there is no respect for the sovereignty of law, he said, referring to laws that conflict with EU rules and principles, regulations governing public purchases that have changed 10 times without proper advanced study, and ongoing government pressures on companies through the sudden imposition of assorted taxes. Erdogan, who finds it hard to tolerate criticism in the best of times, called Yilmaz a “traitor”. Yilmaz responded the next day. In a statement to the press, he deplored the nature of language that was being used in public discourse. He said that he had dedicated his life to the welfare of the nation and that he represented a business association that contributed greatly to the Turkish economy. He then reiterated his warning that the type of invective that Erdogan used was alienating large sectors of the public and aggravating polarisation. Turkey's future, Yilmaz said, would be bleak unless a more rational mode of political polemic and behaviour were adopted.
