Erdoğan in the driver's seat, but Gül has the map

Yavuz Baydar
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The March 30 municipal elections unleashed new dynamics, while cementing some existing ones. It has underlined in bold the fault lines in Turkish society, dividing the constituencies on identities more visible, vocal, obstinate and confrontational than before. This is the product of Erdoğan's choices.

With the aggressive alienation and demonization of the Hizmet movement, the electorate behind the Justice and Development Party's (AKP) success story lost a significant bloc, although it was not displayed in quantities. The deliberate loss of Hizmet affiliates means that the Erdoğan-led AKP is now on its own core constituents; it has pushed off the last remaining group of stakeholders which had laid hopes for a brand new, civilian constitutional order. Hizmet did on the social field what any civil movement would do: Exert democratic pressure over a government whose moral aspects had come to be questioned.

Now that important social bloc has been pushed harshly aside, Turkey has arrived at the point where only political checks and balances remain. It is obvious that the race for the presidency until August will take place in a political and administrative muddle, which was imposed on Turkey since late last year. The graft probe is out in the open, with huge amounts of questions to be answered, with aspects of immunities, alleged crimes of constitution, Internet regulations and a number of laws either in effect or, as with the National Intelligence Organization (MİT) bill, approaching that stage.
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Excerpted from Mr. Baydar's column published on Sunday's Zaman, 06 April 2014, Sunday