Political divisions and legal semantics further deepen the divide within Turkey's political establishment, reports Gareth Jenkins in Ankara Turkey's long-standing political crisis became even more confused lately as the successful passage of a package of constitutional amendments to allow the election of the president by popular vote was swiftly followed by the abrupt collapse of the planned merger of two opposition parties in the run-up to early general elections on 22 July. At the beginning of May, the Turkish Constitutional Court annulled a parliamentary vote for the country's next president, citing a hitherto unknown requirement that the successful candidate must have the support of two thirds of the 550 MPs in the assembly. The court's decision came just days after the Turkish military had warned it would intervene to prevent the government of the moderate Islamist Justice and Development Party (JDP) from appointing Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul as president, claiming that he was insufficiently committed to the preservation of the principle of secularism enshrined in the Turkish constitution. The JDP currently has 359 parliamentary deputies, eight short of the two thirds specified by the Constitutional Court. The JDP immediately announced early general elections and pushed through a package of constitutional amendments, including a proposal to allow the president to be elected by popular vote. The amendments were vetoed by the incumbent president, Ahmet Necdet Sezer, on the grounds that, unless sufficient safeguards were attached, a popular vote for the presidency could endanger the secular regime. Under Turkish law, the president can only veto legislation once. If it is passed again by parliament in an identical form, the president has to approve it, although he also has the right to submit constitutional amendments to a referendum 120 days later. The JDP is generally expected to win the largest share of the vote in the 22 July elections, but it is unclear whether it will win a majority in parliament, much less the two thirds majority needed to appoint its own candidate to the presidency under the current system. As a result, it is trying to change the system as quickly as possible, confident that its Gul will win any popular vote. Under Turkish law, constitutional amendments need the support of two thirds of the members of parliament. On Thursday the JDP enlisted the support of the Motherland Party (MP) in order to be able to pass the constitutional amendments, in the expectation that they would then be put to a referendum by Sezer. In return, the JDP promised the MP that it would not attempt to shorten the 120-day period required before a referendum can be held. On Saturday, the JDP promptly reneged on its promise and pushed through just such an amendment to the relevant law, which, as it is not part of the constitution, just needs a simple majority. The new law cuts the waiting period to 45 days, which would enable the referendum to be held at the same time as the 22 July elections, and to be immediately followed by a popular vote for the presidency. But this law too can be vetoed once by Sezer. To confuse matters further, one of the constitutional amendments in the package passed on Thursday -- to reduce the maximum parliamentary term from five years to four -- received the support of only 366 MPs, one short of the two thirds required. Several opposition politicians have claimed that this invalidates the entire package of constitutional amendments and that they will apply to the Constitutional Court for them all to be annulled. The issue has divided legal experts, although the division appears more dependent on attitudes towards the JDP than the legal issues involved. "The latest package of constitutional amendments is invalid," said Professor Erdogan Tezic, an expert on constitutional law and a long-time opponent of the JDP. "The law clearly states that each clause must have a two thirds majority or the entire package is invalidated." But supporters of the JDP dismiss such arguments as politically motivated and reflect the reluctance of the secular establishment to relax its control of the Turkish political system. "Turkey has to choose between a half- democracy under the shadow of a guardianship regime and a real liberal democracy," said Professor Ergun Ozbudun of Bilkent University. But it is also possible that the JDP may not need a popular vote to have its candidate appointed to the presidency. Under the Turkish electoral system, seats in parliament are divided between parties which win more than 10 per cent of the popular vote. Only two parties crossed the 10 per cent threshold in the last elections in November 2002 and the JDP's 34.7 per cent of the vote gave it 363 of the 550 seats in parliament. As a result, the JDP's ability to form a majority after the 22 July elections depends less on the size of its vote, than on the number of parties which cross the 10 per cent threshold. Last month, the MP announced a merger with the True Path Party (TPP). Neither party had been expected to cross the threshold on its own but the united party stood a good chance of receiving 11-12 per cent. On Friday, in an extraordinary act of political suicide, MP Chairman Erkan Mumcu announced on national television that the TPP had insulted his honour and that the MP was withdrawing from the merger. The announcement stunned the TPP, which seemed unaware of any such insults. But the public manner in which Mumcu made his accusations made it impossible for the damage to be repaired. Both the TPP and the MP will now enter the elections on their own, and will find it very difficult to cross the 10 per cent threshold. And the less parties there are in parliament, the more seats will the JDP be likely to win.
