The Turks have begun voting in early elections today...and it's important.
The elections were called after secular parties and the Army - along with thousands of demonstrators - blocked the Islamist AK party's PM Recip Tayyip Erdogan's attempt to appoint another Islamist from his party, Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul, as president.
The election is a clear indication on which way Turkey will go - towards an alignment with the West or towards Islamism. The Erdogan government has been increasingly aligned with Iran and against the US.
In some sense, it's also a referendum between rural Turkey - where traditional Islamic beliefs are more prevelant- and the more sophisticated, largely seular populations in the cities.
Some 42 million people are eligible to vote in the poll, while 14 parties are vying for seats in the 550-member parliament. Turnout is expected to be high.
Another wild card in all this is the army..who are predominantly secular, and actually have a constitutional mandate to protect Turkey's secular government. They've used it more than once.
3 comments:
You wrote that AK party government has sided with Iran against the US. I'm a Turk and I would like to ask when and where? What does siding mean? How did Erdogan undermined the US? Your hate and buffoonery blinds you so much so that you vomit on people's shoes as you write bunkum and children's tales and fables. Turkey whether under Erdogan or any other Turkish leader remains an ally of the USA, but that doesn't mean Turkey doesn't have interests either like signing cheap energy deals with Iran. Why do you think your country {USA} invaded Iraq and bombed all the people? Isn't it for energy and vested interests. You said AK party is supported by rural people. First of all, the rural people are part of the Turkish nation so they play a constructive role like any other segment. That said, Ak party won all the local government councils and governers in all the leading cities in Turkey including Ankara and Istanbul, is that rural? Again, AK party led the rest in 76 provinces out of 81 so much so that it felled four Prime Ministers in the last elections, how do you explain it? Again, in the latest Pew global poll conducted last month, Kemalists were the ones who voted against the US, so much so that Turkey become no.1 country in the world where the US is hated. Why do you think the urbanites secular rejected your country and even the leading secular opposition party is saying we should sever ties with the EU, is this rural? Friend, I have been to the USA, even last year I was there, as an economics student and I have seen how mind locked the US bloggers are, and you remain {i have just came across your website now} one of the buffoonish and swinish elements who ignorantly pretend to know anything while you know nothing. Your language smacks of arrogance and dominance and you think those who have different ideas to be fools, yet you have a fool president who has sneazed on all of you. You wrote that the Turkish army has a constitutional mandate to break up governments, I love this one. Is this the way you feed your programmed people? Is this the way you give them sealed information that defies both truth, logic and reason? Where did you get that? The fact that the milatary is losing power to the people and they overturning past governments doesn't mean they have any right to dictate to Turks. Their primary job is to protect Turkey. It seems that you want to teach us about our nation as well, though i know you wrote this absurd figment to convince your programmed fools. Friend, we know what is good for our nation. We want peace with everyone and we know where does our interests lie and our nation knows how to act when there arises a critical stage to prove what is good for this beloved nation. We are secular forever, we are peaceful forever, we are 99% Muslims forever, we are powerful forever, we are friends of the world forever, and at the same time we love our past and heritage because it us who travelled that road. Happy Turkey
Turkey's ruling AK Party won 48.1 percent of the vote in a landslide national election victory on Sunday after two thirds of votes had been counted.
I believe you now know where Turkey stands in your 'war' against jihad.
Gee, Anonymous...
Now tell me how you really feel.
If you read the link in the article, as well as other stories I've posted, it's quite obvious which way the AK party and Erdogan are leaning.
I notice you don't contradict my remarks on how this is partly a referendum of the rural, more Islamist Turkey vs. the more secular cities. The rurla Turks are indeed part of Turkey. And that's why the Islamist AK party maintains a majority.
As for the military, they have long maintained that they have a mandate to maintain Turkey's secular constitution, and have intervened a number of times. That's simple fact, whether you want deny it or not. The fact that you feel they don't have the `right' to do so is moot and immaterial.
You wrote "We are secular forever, we are peaceful forever, we are 99% Muslims forever". Fine, but `secular' is not what the Erdogan government is about.As for `99% Muslim'...true enough. Although the road to that `99% Muslim' status was paved with blood.
I acknowledge that the AK Party has likely won the election, and I also agree with you that this is a clear indication of where Turkey stands in the war against jihad.
In fact, that was the point of the article, and I thank you for providing such a superb verification of the basic truth of it.
Regards,
FF
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