The Turkish election on June 12 is considered a success to almost everyone involved, comments Thomas Gür, advisor to the Jarl Hjalmarson Foundation.
The election on June 12 could be considered a success for almost everyone concerned. The ruling AK Party strengthened its support among voters from 47 percent of the votes in 2007 to close to 50 percent. While in government, the AK Party has earned a gradually increased support in three parliamentary elections and successfully faced the electorate in two local and regional elections as well as in two referendums.

 This largest opposition party, the left wing/nationalist party CHP received an increased election support and a stronger stand in parliament. The nationalist MHP was able to retain its support. Its 13 percent kept the party in parliament, in spite of fears that the party would end up below the 10 percent threshold. The independent candidates, primarily Kurdish politicians, almost doubled their share of the parliament by taking 36 seats. (more…)

On June 12, Turkey goes to the ballot boxes. “The ongoing campaign is probably the most person-oriented campaign that I’ve ever seen in Turkey” comments Thomas Gür, senior advisor to the Jarl Hjalmarson Foundation. While the AK will claim a landslide victory “with 40 to 50 percent of the votes” and form a majority government, the key issue is whether the AKP will manage to achieve at least 330 of the 550 seats in Parliament. “With such a majority, the AK Party would be able to put constitutional changes up for a public vote. Making constitutional changes in Parliament would require 367 of the votes, i.e. two thirds.”

The classic ferry route across the Bosphorus leaves from Eminönü, home of the new Mosque (inaugurated in 1655), to the Üsküdar, a city founded in the 700’Th century and formerly known as Chrysopolis or Scutari. At the ferry slip at Üsküdar, nowadays a municipality within Greater Istanbul, the campaign for the June 12 election is running on full speed.

Campaign workers hand out leaflets to surpassing ferry passengers as they enter and leave the terminal. The air is filled with the sounds of fluttering party pennants and flags hanging from the trees and streetlights, side by side with the mandatory Turkish flags. However, the sound environment is not likely to invite to neither spontaneous small talk nor serious discussion with party representatives. The low key square meeting speakers have been replaced by loudspeaker from at least three parties at the time – all of them shouting out pompous music mixed with recorded speeches of the party leaders. The loudspeakers thrones at the top of huge trucks with open sides – combinations of mobile election stands and propaganda machines equipped with some serious audio visual technology. (more…)

On June 2, 2010, the Jarl Hjalmarson Foundation in cooperation with the Olof Palme International Center and the Swedish Consulate General in Istanbul arranged a conference on the subject of Turkey’s membership to the European Union. While agreeing that Turkey should, indeed, join the Union, the participants disagreed on when and how this could be accomplished. Although Turkey is in the process of moving in the right direction, much remains unsolved, especially regarding human rights, corruption and the military influence in the civil society.

 (In the photo: Göran Lennmarker, Chairman of the Swedish Parliamentary Committee for Foreign Affairs as well as the chairman of the Jarl Hjalmarson Foundation, discusses with Canan Kalsin, MP for the Turkish party in government, the AK Party and vice Chairman of the AK Party’s international office.)

  (more…)

In late February, a civilian Turkish prosecutor ordered the arrest of some ten senior officers, still active in the Turkish armed forces. The officers were accused of planning a coup d’états against the present AK party government. This is the first time representatives of the Turkish civilian judicial system have arrested such a large number of still active officers for planning a coup.

In late February, a civilian Turkish prosecutor ordered the arrest of some ten senior officers, still active within the Turkish armed forces. The officers were accused of preparing a coup against the then AK-party government led by Prime Minister Abdullah Gül, today the Turkish president.

The arrest came after plans of the coup had been published in a Turkish newspaper, Taraf. According to the paper, around 150 officers, including some twenty generals had been making plans at a seminar, officially focusing on planning a war role game.  Whether this was indeed a war role game or a coup masked as a game, and, if the latter turns out to be the case, the roles of the individual officers will now be examined in a juridical process. (more…)

In 2008, the AK Party – the Turkish cooperation partner of the Jarl Hjalmarson Foundation and Moderaterna – had an eventful year. Last summer the Turkish constitutional court threatened to shut down the party. Subsequently, fights flared up when the Partiya Karkerên Kurdistan (PKK) moved from its bases in Northern Iraq and attacked both military and civilian targets in Turkey.

 In addition, the AK party was forced to deal with allegations of corruption, a particularly sensitive subject to a party whose unique selling point is to try to move away from Turkey’s corrupt past. Furthermore, there was the so called Ergenekon affair, a conspiracy by the “deep state” – people with a background in the military or the elite bureaucracy – against the democratically elected government. (more…)