The Democratization Package That Missed the Point
Ersan Sen, a well-known lawyer, argues that the government’s democratization package missed the point because it did not offer any changes to political parties or the election law put into effect after the 1980 military coup.
Turkey is due for a significant legal update. On Monday, Sept. 30, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced the long-awaited democratization package. The next day, Oct. 1, the Turkish parliament reconvened from its summer recess and Speaker Cemil Cicek said that the 17-month-long effort of the parliamentary constitutional reconciliation commission, tasked to write a new constitution for the nation, is not looking promising.
“Despite the longing and expectation of our nation, despite our promise to our nation, despite that it is a necessity and obligation, for example, we have not been able to put a new and civilian constitution before the people based on societal consensus, having its priorities, principles, balance and standards,” he said.
Although the proposed legal changes have not yet been officially submitted to the parliament, and therefore it is still premature to conclusively talk about the contents of these new potential articles, it is a fact that the government has enough seats in the parliament to accomplish its goal of enacting these bills, whereas writing a new constitution cannot be accomplished by one party’s will.
Given the pace of all these legal updates to be accomplished, Erdogan therefore must have felt the need to state the following last night at the parliament’s opening reception: “Among the changes into law, none requires constitutional amendment. We took on this path believing it. All others that require a constitutional amendment, that is being worked upon.”
