A curious pall hovered over Turkey in the days that preceded the Soma calamity. The people of the Anatolian plateau where Mustafa Kemal Ataturk created the modern Republic of Turkey in the years after the First World War were in a quandary. How could they explain the remarks of a man who as leader of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) has not only headed the Turkish government for the past 12 years but has also come to regard himself as above all political conventions? In his pride and arrogance Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan seems happy to pontificate at length, pausing only to allow applause and bask in veneration, much like the fascists of yesteryear whom people had imagined had been consigned to the dustbins of history. The country's state-controlled media cover his every word, yet when another official assumes the podium and speaks longer than his allotted time, Erdogan flies into a rage, interrupts the proceedings, hurls insults at the podium, and storms out of the room heedless of his high office. When the news of the Soma disaster struck, in which an explosion in a coal mine gave rise to the worst mining disaster in Turkey's history, Erdogan was in the central Anatolian town of Afyon, where he took advantage of a meeting of the AKP to lash out against his adversaries and warn of the dire consequences that would follow for judges who “meddle in politics”. This ominous display was given full coverage by the AKP propaganda machine. However, the shock of the disaster nevertheless seemed to knock the wind out of Erdogan, who hours after the tragedy appeared humbled, perhaps because he realised that his government was responsible for the deteriorating safety conditions in the mine. During his “inspection” of Soma after the disaster, he heard the cries of widowed women and orphaned children, the groans of elderly men who had lost their sons, and the curses of friends and relatives in the humble mining town. It a rare occasion for Erdogan to come face-to-face with the raw anger of the people, safe as he was behind a thick cordon of security guards and police. Not even the most pro-government of Turkey's media has been able to underplay the disaster. Erdogan's attempt to place the tragedy within the context of mining accidents from 19th-century Europe only invited charges of insensitivity, leaving many with mouths gaping. In an attempt to deflect the glare and perhaps alleviate the wrath felt by millions against his government, Erdogan took part in the memorial prayers at the Sultan Eyüp Mosque in Istanbul, and he even helped carry the coffin of one of the victims. However, this display quickly stirred widespread censure, with critics accusing him of opportunism and of turning the ceremony into a “market for selling lies”. The arrest of 18 officials responsible for safety in the mines was also seen as a case of too little, too late. The officials were arrested after testimony from experts showed that the company had lied about safety conditions in the mine, being forced to admit, contrary to initial claims, that there were no rescue chambers to which miners could rush in the event of an emergency though there were plans to build them in future. As the death toll from the tragedy continued to rise, the anger continued to mount. The governor of the Manisa region in which Soma is located banned all public protests “in this critical and delicate period,” and the security forces set up roadblocks at the entrances to the town. All vehicles entering are now subjected to searches, and visitors are prohibited. Zaman, an English-language newspaper close to the Islamist preacher Muhammed Fethullah Gülen, mocked the statements of officials and the company owner who has insistently denied responsibility for the catastrophe. The government and the mine owner are not to blame for the tragedy, the newspaper sarcastically commented. “The victims are, which is why they should be pulled out of their graves and prosecuted,” an editorial commented. On Saturday, lawyers belonging to an association of legal rights activists gathered in front of the AKP headquarters in Istanbul's Çeglayan neighbourhood to denounce the catastrophe, which they described as not an accident but a crime. The spokesperson of the organisation, Ferat Özdemir, announced that his group had initiated legal proceedings against the AKP and specifically Erdogan, Minister of Energy and Natural Resources Taner Yildiz and Minister of Labour and Social Security Faruk Çelik on the grounds of their responsibility for the tragedy. Meanwhile, the AKP has been scrambling to prevent investigations through the work of lawyers loyal to the Party. To preempt these manoeuvres, the association has sent its own lawyers to the site to inspect the mine and has announced that it will publicise its findings. Özdemir also criticised Erdogan's statements in the aftermath of the tragedy, saying that the prime minister had “mocked the intelligence” of the Turkish people by suggesting that they were not abreast of the technological developments of the 21st — century — a reference to Erdogan's use of 19th-century mining disasters to bolster his claims that such disasters were to be expected in mines. Experts at the Ankara Strategic Institute observed that mining practices in Europe had advanced considerably over the past century and that Turkey stood alone in the world in terms of the number and magnitude of the mining accidents it had experienced over the past decade. They also said that the tragedy at Soma could have been averted had the necessary safety precautions been put in place, adding that as long as the current disregard for proper safety standards persisted, Soma would not be the country's last mining disaster. Ibrahim Bolat, an expert at the Institute, said that statistics from the International Labour Organisation's (ILO) report on work-related accidents and occupational safety standards in Turkey were “very embarrassing” for the country. The report stated that the larger portion of work-related accidents in Turkey occurred in the mining and quarrying sector and that the rates of these were increasing. In like manner, Fahri Aral from the college of health and occupational safety at Istanbul's Kemerburgaz University noted that Turkey had one of the world's poorest records for workplace safety. It had the highest number of deaths in work-related accidents in Europe and the third highest in the world, he said. According to the editor of Turkey's Yurt newspaper, Merdan Yanardag, “the disaster has once again shaken public confidence in the Erdogan government. Pressures on it will mount because it is blamed for the negligence that has led to the deaths of hundreds of workers. The coming days will bring more demonstrations, especially in view of the approaching first anniversary of the Gezi Park events triggered in late May last year in Istanbul.” “Erdogan is not just afraid of losing power,” Yanardag added. “He is afraid of being investigated, brought to trial, and eventually sentenced to prison for his involvement in crimes of negligence and fraud, as well as cases of graft, corruption and other illegalities. All of these are acts against the republic.” In 2008, the Turkish Supreme Constitutional Court explicitly cautioned Erdogan against undermining the principles of the Turkish Republic. According to many observers, we may now be beginning to glimpse the fate that awaits the self-styled padishah of 21st-century Turkey.
