This Sunday, September 12th, there will be a referendum in Turkey on a large package of proposed changes to the Turkish constitution. It is also the 30th anniversary of the 1980 coup in Turkey.
The package of proposed constitutional changes was written by and is supported by the government and the party currently in power, the AKP. It is opposed by more or less all of the opposition parties.
Traditionally referendums on proposed changes to the constitution in Turkey are approved, usually by very high margins. According to polls, including AKP polls, the approval for this package is currently between 52% and 54% and the final result will depend on voter turnout.
The wide-ranging package of proposed changes contains 26 articles. The government decided that the proposed changes will be voted on as a package, not individually.
The reason for this is that the package contains many relatively minor proposed changes which are fairly standard and acceptable to essentially everyone in the country and which are being concentrated on by the government and the AKP, but it also contains several controversial proposals.
The most controversial would allow the government to stack the Constitutional Court (Supreme Court) by raising the number of members from 11 to 17, and would also make it easier to put party supporters on the Constitutional Court. Other proposed changes would also make it easier for the government to appoint prosecutors. This would make prosecutors more of a political position than a professional civil service position.
The government and the AKP want to take control of the Constitutional Court because it has overturned several controversial laws which the government wants to enact. Another reason for their wanting to do this, according to the opposition, is that the Constitutional Court is the only body in Turkey which can try current or former government officials and the current government wants to insure that they will not be found guilty of corruption after leaving or being voted out of office in the future.
Another proposed controversial change would make it more difficult for political parties to be closed. Currently parties can be closed by a two-thirds vote of the Constitutional Court for advocating positions which are unconstitutional, such as changing Turkey from a secular country to a religious country or splitting Turkey up into more than one country. The current government wants to put this under the control of the Parliament.
Another proposed change would be the cancellation of immunity in the current constitution for all the members of the councils and assemblies who held office between the coup of 1980 and the return to civilian government in 1983. This is largely symbolic because passing laws which are retroactive is forbidden in other articles of the constitution.
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September 12th is also the 30th anniversary of the 1980 coup in which the Turkish military took power.
In the late 1970s Turkey went through a period of extreme upheaval. There were armed street battles between nationalists, socialists, secularists, non-secularists, capitalists and communists. Thousands of people were killed during these street battles or shot while just waiting for the bus because they belonged to the 'wrong' group.
It became impossible for a government to be formed or govern and for a new president to be elected. A famine was developing, education and the economy came to a standstill and unemployment reached extreme levels.
Then on September 12th, 1980 the military stepped in and took over governing the country.
It has been reported that 650,000 people were arrested and 230,000 people were tried during the time the military was in power. I have no statistics as to how many were convicted.
I have also read and been told that the military crackdown was universal and applied to all factions and that instead of segregating members of different factions into separate areas in prisons, the military put members from the different factions in the same cells and prison blocks in order to force them to talk with each other so that they would learn to understand and get along with each other.
It has also been reported that 299 people died in prison during this time for reasons including natural death, suicide, hunger strikes, fights among opposing factions and being killed during escape attempts. Additionally, 171 people have been reported to have died while being tortured and 50 people were executed after being found guilty in court.
The military appointed a 160-member Consultative Assembly to draft a new constitution on June 29th, 1981. This constitution was approved by 92% of the Turkish public in a referendum on November 7, 1982. It took effect on November 9th, 1982 and the transition to civilian government began.
General elections were announced in the summer of 1983 and held on November 6th, 1983. The elected civilian government took office on December 13th, 1983.
Martial law was then lifted gradually, county by county, and finally ended completely on July 19th, 1987.
It was also during this period that some members of the military promoted the idea that Kurdish people were "Mountain Turks".
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During the time I have been in Turkey I have observed that a very high percentage of people here either approve of the coup in 1980 or accept that it was necessary.
In the past few years a few attempts have been made in the media to accentuate the harsh measures carried out by the military during this time. However, these attempts have generally presented no information about the conditions which existed before the coup.
The reason I initially became interested in learning about the coup when I first came to Turkey - in 1987 - was because of my work. In the first year I was in Turkey I was a ‘show teacher’. I went to 32 classes with 24 students in each class for conversation for one lesson every week. Almost all of my students were beginners between the ages of 18 and 22, so we started off with things like ‘What’s your name?’, ‘How old are you?’, ‘What’s your father’s name?’, ‘How old is your father?’, etc.
When I asked ‘How old is your father?’ I got the answer ‘My father is dead.’ or 'My father died.' from at least one student in each class and sometimes from two or three students in each class. This amazed me so I decided to learn about what had happened. It was then that I learned about the conditions which had existed before the coup.
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It has been reported that the straw that broke the camel’s back in the military’s decision to take control of the Turkish government was the ‘Save Jerusalem Protest March’ which happened on September 6th, 1980 in Konya, Turkey. It was organized by the National Salvation Party.
An estimated 100,000 people participated, and many wore Ottoman Empire style clothing. During the protest march many buildings, especially those selling alcohol, were damaged. The Turkish National Anthem was ridiculed and the Islamic flag was carried instead of the Turkish flag.
These slogans were shouted and signs with these slogans, some written in the Ottoman alphabet, were carried during the protest march:
The godless government will be destroyed.
Islam is Shariat and the Koran is the constitution.
We will take our right to Shariat by force.
Long live our right to an Islamic government.
Shariat or death.
We will struggle until we get our government.
One Caliph. One government.
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The National Salvation Party was closed after the 1980 coup and was succeeded by the Welfare Party which was founded in 1983. In 1998 the Welfare Party was banned for violating the principle of secularism in the constitution.
The Welfare Party was succeeded by the Virtue Party which was founded in December 1998. In June 2001 the Virtue Party was banned for violating the principle of secularism in the constitution.
The AKP was founded in August 2001 by a faction of the banned Virtue Party.
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A quick note on a different subject: I have read news reports that at least one of the three American hikers who are being held by Iran will be released tomorrow. Guardian link
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These are some excerpts from The Constitution of The Republic of Turkey which might interest readers.
From the Preamble:
... this Constitution ... embodies
...
The understanding of the absolute supremacy of the will of the nation and of the fact that sovereignty is vested fully and unconditionally in the Turkish nation and that no individual or body empowered to exercise this sovereignty in the name of the nation shall deviate from liberal democracy and the legal system instituted according to its requirements;
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The recognition that all Turkish citizens are united in national honour and pride, in national joy and grief, in their rights and duties regarding national existence, in blessings and in burdens, and in every manifestation of national life, and that they have the right to demand a peaceful life based on absolute respect for one another’s rights and freedoms, mutual love and fellowship and the desire for and belief in "Peace at home, peace in the world".
...
From the Constitution:
ARTICLE 1. The Turkish State is a Republic.
ARTICLE 2. The Republic of Turkey is a democratic, secular and social state governed by the rule of law; bearing in mind the concepts of public peace, national solidarity and justice; respecting human rights; loyal to the nationalism of Atatürk, and based on the fundamental tenets set forth in the Preamble.
ARTICLE 3. The Turkish state, with its territory and nation, is an indivisible entity. Its language is Turkish.
Its flag, the form of which is prescribed by the relevant law, is composed of a white crescent and star on a red background.
Its national anthem is the "Independence March".
Its capital is Ankara.
ARTICLE 4. The provision of Article 1 of the Constitution establishing the form of the state as a Republic, the provisions in Article 2 on the characteristics of the Republic, and the provision of Article 3 shall not be amended, nor shall their amendment be proposed.
Articles 1-4 are the biggest problem for the Islamic parties.
ARTICLE 10. All individuals are equal without any discrimination before the law, irrespective of language, race, colour, sex, political opinion, philosophical belief, religion and sect, or any such considerations.
Men and women have equal rights. The State shall have the obligation to ensure that this equality exists in practice.
No privilege shall be granted to any individual, family, group or class.
State organs and administrative authorities shall act in compliance with the principle of equality before the law in all their proceedings.
Article 10 - Section 1 "or any such considerations" may lead to universal marriage rights one day.
Article 10 - Section 3 rules out a royal family, caliph, religious class, etc.
ARTICLE 66. Everyone bound to the Turkish state through the bond of citizenship is a Turk.
Article 66 defines ‘Turk’ as being based on citizenship not ethnicity. People can be whatever ethnicity they want to be, but a person who is a citizen of The Republic of Turkey is legally defined to be a ‘Turk’.
ARTICLE 60. Everyone has the right to social security.
The state shall take the necessary measures and establish the organisation for the provision of social security.
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