ANKARA, Turkey, May 1 — Turkey's constitutional court today supported an effort to block a candidate for the country's presidency whose background is in political Islam, pitching the country into early national elections and a referendum on the role of religion in its future.
In a 9 to 2 ruling, the court upheld an appeal by the main secular political party to stop Abdullah Gul, the current foreign minister and a close ally of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, from becoming president, objecting to what it says are his Islamic credentials.
But the ruling, which involved the legality of a parliamentary vote for Mr. Gul that was held last Friday, was more political than legal: The court is part of Turkey's secular establishment, which is now mounting an assault against Mr. Erdogan and the emerging class of devout Turks that he represents, and its decision did not come as a surprise.
<http://www.atilim.org/haberler/2007/05/01/1st_of_May__victory_of_the_working_class_in_Turkey.html> 1st of May; victory of the working class in Turkey Foto: 1st of May; victory of the working class in Turkey
ENGLISH (01.05.2007)- The heart of the 1st of May Worker's Day celebrations in Turkey was the Taksim Square of Istanbul.
After the massacre of the 1977 1st of May, Taksim Square had been a prohibited area for worker and popular demonstrations. Although it is open to all sorts of celebrations (including Police Week, national fests, New Year celebrations, reactionary meetings etc.) the square remained closed to labourer's demonstrations. The square is located in the centre of the city.
This year the proggressive labour unions, chambers and mass organizations, revolutionary, socialist and proggressive political organizations and parties; totally 60 social and political organizations got the decision to celebrate the Mayday at Taksim. Taksim had been a symbol of 1st of May since the 1977 celebrations, in which more thar 500 thousand labourers gathered, and a state-organized massacre took 34 martyrs. This year, is the 30th anniversary of this massacre, and the killers had not been found and tried yet. It is named as "1st of May Square" among the labourers.
The Governorate of Istanbul, as a part of the state policy of prohibiting Taksim Square, applied harsh measures against the gathering. Nearly all the public transportation was prohibited with Governor's decision, and this created a total traffic chaos in Istanbul. Millions of people could not go to their works or schools, spent hours on the highways. This meant a general stopping of work and education life in the city. The people cursed on the Governer Muammer Guler for turning Istanbul into an open air prison.
All the people who came to the gathering place (Dolmabahce) were severely beaten and detained, in the first place the members of the Organizing Committee. Despite the open state terror, the people showed the courage to gather again and again after being dispersed. Totally more than 1000 people were detained.
At the end, the waves of labourer masses, with their steadfastness and determined will, managed to gather at Taksim Square, and made the commemoration of the martyrs of 1977. Thousands of people, breaking the blockade of the police, managed to free Taksim Square from the chains of state terror. Groups of demonstrators, numbering thousands, entered the square again and again, despite the attacks of the police with battons and teargas.
All around Istanbul turned into a resistance field, because the busses carrying the people to the meeting were stopped by the police. Thousands of workers cut the main highway of Istanbul (at three points) and began walking. In labourer districts Okmeydani, Gulsuyu and 1st of May, thousands of people clashed with the police. 1st of May turned into a Istanbul-wide general resistance.
In the end of the day, it was the workers who won, and the state was the loser of the day. The public opinion turned furious against the Governor because of his crazy prohibition of public transport. The demand for his resign gained large public support.
1st of May was also celebrated in many towns such as Izmır, Ankara, Adana, Bursa, Eskisehir. In all the 1st of May events, the attack in Istanbul was protested and the Governor was called to resign.
The conquest of Taksim had been tried three times in 1989, 1990, 1991 and for the first time it is managed. Regarding the heavy repression conditions under which Turkey is living, and especially the hard conditions that arose with the memorandum of the military, the importance of this success becomes greater. Also the 1st of May had been a third channel of political stand, against the two bourgeois sectors; the government and the army. The labourers have opened their way with their will.
<http://www.atilim.org/haberler/2007/04/28/Threat_of_coup_d_etat_in_Turkey.html> Threat of coup d'etat in Turkey Foto: Threat of coup d'etat in Turkey
ENGLISH (28.04.2007)- The fascist army intervened in the Presidency elections held in the National Assembly by a threatening declaration last night, at 11.15 pm. The declaration was directed against the right of the parliament to elect Abdullah Gul as President, claiming that the "principal question in the Presidential elections process has been secularism". The declaration came just after the first round of the Presidential elections, while the opposition party CHP had brought the voting to the Constitutional Court, claiming that the number of attended deputies is not sufficient to make the voting. If the Court takes a decision accordingly, this will lead to the abondoning of the Presidential elections and will begin a process of early elections.
In the declaration, the following phrases took part:
"In the last days, the principal question in the Presidential election process has been focused on secularism. This situation is being watched by the Turkish Armed Forces with anxiousness. It shouldn't be forgotten that, the Turkish Armed Forces are a side in these discussions and is the staunch defender of secularism. Furthermore, the Turkish Armed Forces are against these discussions and the negative comments, and will display their position and attitudes openly and strictly, when necessary. Noone should have any doubt about this. In short, anyone who opposes the understanding of the founder of our Republic, Great Leader Ataturk; 'Happy is the one who calls himself a Turk', is and will be an enemy of the Republic of Turkey. The Turkish Armed Forces is determined to fulfill the open duties given to them by the law to protect these qualities, and their devotion and faith to this determination is certain."
The declaration of the Armed Forces is a military memorandum, and a threat of military coup d'etat. When translated into the language of Turkish politics, this memorandum is an intervention to both the Assembly and the Constitutional Court. The army, by this memorandum declared that they viewed the election of Abdullah Gul for Presidency as a "regime problem", and won't let it, even this election is done on a constitutional basis.
Also they threatened the Kurdish national movement and the democratic sectors who question the official ideology, with the referance to the phrase "Happy is the one who calls himself a Turk", since broad sectors of the population (millions of people) are calling themselves as "Kurds" and claiming national democratic rights.
Democratic rights are under threat
The excuse for the memorandum, "secularism", is merely a demagogy. It was the army, during the coup d'etat of 1980, who brought compulsory religion lessons to the education system, it was them who supported the islamic reactionary forces to grow, it was them to found mosques in all the Alevi villages, it was them who accepted Turkish-Islam synthesis as the state ideology. Religious Affairs Presidency (Diyanet İşleri Başkanlığı) is the state institution of religion, which has a huge budget and to which all the mosques and all the imams are subject to. Turkey is not a secular country, since the state is fused with religion.
The generals are fooling the people for gaining mass support for their semi-military fascist regime. They are angry because their share of state power is diminishing, since the Presidency had traditionally been a tool helping the military control the regime.
The fascist memorandum gave a vital importance to the struggle against military coup d'etat and military intervention to politics in Turkey. What is at danger is not secularism, but democratic rights (which are already at a very low level.) The army wants to freeze the constitutional rights of the institutions and govern the country on its own.
We also call all the peoples of the world to protest against this fascist memorandum and to stand near the peoples of Turkey who want freedom and democracy, no more military intervention. -- Yoshie