Gaziantep -- background
I am in Gaziantep, effectively, at the moment, on my own.
Some of you may know I have some involvement with an organisation in London called Peace In Kurdistan, which is run by a woman named Estella. I have been to Istanbul twice (three times? Now I am not sure!) to do trial observations for them. The trial is a political trial of a group of lawyers representing Abdullah Ocalan, the jailed leader of the PKK. There have been peace talks between the PKK and the Turkish government since 2011, and a ceasefire. The lawyers are all charged with "taking messages" from Ocalan to the PKK, basically on the basis that they have had conferences with him. The trial is still not over. There was a hearing date last month, which I didn't go to.
Around six weeks ago, Estella mentioned that a delegation of international observers would be going to south east Turkey between 4 and 10 June to observe the elections. She explained it is a very important election as the Kurdish (mostly) HDP party is poised, potentially, to make significant gains. I said I would love to go, but could not possibly raise the funds. I mentioned it to my colleague Shivani, who promptly instructed another colleague to send an email around chambers asking for donations. Between my colleagues in chambers and Estella, enough money was raised to cover my flights, and I was assured that accommodation would be at a discount.
We have had some instructions sent to us before leaving, including an "election monitor's handbook" which includes admittedly rather predictable advice such as not to engage in any party political activism on polling day, not to speak to the media, and to look out for voter intimidation, confusion and disorganisation around polling places, stuffed ballot boxes, unsealed ballot boxes, etc.
I have also been reading the news about the Kurdish community in Turkey in rather more detail than usual over the last few weeks and so I understand the significance of this election.
Turkey has an electoral threshold requirement that no party achieving less than 10% of the popular vote can take up its seats in Parliament. This was initially aimed both at Kurdish and religious parties, to keep them out of Parliament, and was instigated in the 1980 constitution, written after a military (secular) coup. It wasn't terribly effective against religious parties because they have not only significantly more than 10% support but in fact enough to win elections on a fairly regular basis, which is why there were successive military coups (most of them bloodless) between 1980 and 2000, and why in the end the Islamist AKP party, led by Reccep Tayyip Erdogan, came to power in 2002 and has been in power ever since -- although Erdogan recently stood down as Prime Minister and ran and won the most recent presidential elections, so he's President Erdogan now. Before this happened, it was quite obvious it was going to, and many Turkey-watchers thought that his right-hand man Abdullah Gul would be installed as Prime Minister and good reason to believe that they might try pulling a Putin/Medvedev by switching roles every few years. However, there seems to have been a falling-out between Gul and Erdogan. Ahmet Davutoglu became leader of the party, and thus PM.
The Kurdish parties, however, quite apart from being periodically banned due to alleged links to the PKK, have never been able to reach the 10% threshold. This is partly because the Kurdish vote is split, with religiously conservative Kurds voting for religiously conservative Turkish parties, and secular nationalist Kurds voting for Kurdish parties. So what candidates for the Kurdish parties have traditionally done is run as independents (who are exempt from the 10% threshold) and then, once elected to parliament, operated in a bloc. This is also, I think, part of what has been holding down their percentage of the popular vote.
However, the political situation in Turkey has been shifting with the rise of ISIS and events in Kobane, as well as following the Gezi Park protests two years ago. Turkey is experiencing a crisis in the sheer numbers of the influx of refugees from Syria, which is hitting the south-east quite hard. Many here are disillusioned with the AKP who they think are not handling the crisis effectively. Kurds, even those who traditionally support the AKP, are angry about Turkey's failure to provide military support to Syrian Kurds fighting ISIS in the siege of Kobane. And, finally, the Kurdish movement has -- at least temporarily -- aligned itself with leftists and other minority groups -- Alevis, Laz, Circassians, Nestorian Christians, Arabs, etc -- and particularly with those involved in the Gezi Park protests, under the new banner of the HDP ("People's Democratic Party"). They also benefit from quite a charismatic leader, named Selahattin Demirtas, who actually won 9% of the vote in last year's presidential election.
So, the HDP is, for the first time for a Kurdish party, running as a party, instead of as independents. It's quite a gamble. If they don't meet the threshold, the won't get their seats, which will then go to the second-highest vote-winner in the affected races, which will almost universally be the AKP. Whether they reach the threshold or not could therefore be the difference between whether Erdogan gets the supermajority necessary to make significant constitutional changes, turning Turkey from a parliamentary into a presidential system (ie, significantly increasing his own power), without the need for more than a vote in parliament, or whether he is so few seats short of this that he can't even bring about these changes through a referendum. This in turn could have a significant impact on the conduct of the peace process. Basically, if Erdogan gets his additional presidential powers, he will be able to call the tune of the talks; if not, the Kurds will be in a significantly more powerful position.
So, here I am. The journey's been rather interesting...
Some of you may know I have some involvement with an organisation in London called Peace In Kurdistan, which is run by a woman named Estella. I have been to Istanbul twice (three times? Now I am not sure!) to do trial observations for them. The trial is a political trial of a group of lawyers representing Abdullah Ocalan, the jailed leader of the PKK. There have been peace talks between the PKK and the Turkish government since 2011, and a ceasefire. The lawyers are all charged with "taking messages" from Ocalan to the PKK, basically on the basis that they have had conferences with him. The trial is still not over. There was a hearing date last month, which I didn't go to.
Around six weeks ago, Estella mentioned that a delegation of international observers would be going to south east Turkey between 4 and 10 June to observe the elections. She explained it is a very important election as the Kurdish (mostly) HDP party is poised, potentially, to make significant gains. I said I would love to go, but could not possibly raise the funds. I mentioned it to my colleague Shivani, who promptly instructed another colleague to send an email around chambers asking for donations. Between my colleagues in chambers and Estella, enough money was raised to cover my flights, and I was assured that accommodation would be at a discount.
We have had some instructions sent to us before leaving, including an "election monitor's handbook" which includes admittedly rather predictable advice such as not to engage in any party political activism on polling day, not to speak to the media, and to look out for voter intimidation, confusion and disorganisation around polling places, stuffed ballot boxes, unsealed ballot boxes, etc.
I have also been reading the news about the Kurdish community in Turkey in rather more detail than usual over the last few weeks and so I understand the significance of this election.
Turkey has an electoral threshold requirement that no party achieving less than 10% of the popular vote can take up its seats in Parliament. This was initially aimed both at Kurdish and religious parties, to keep them out of Parliament, and was instigated in the 1980 constitution, written after a military (secular) coup. It wasn't terribly effective against religious parties because they have not only significantly more than 10% support but in fact enough to win elections on a fairly regular basis, which is why there were successive military coups (most of them bloodless) between 1980 and 2000, and why in the end the Islamist AKP party, led by Reccep Tayyip Erdogan, came to power in 2002 and has been in power ever since -- although Erdogan recently stood down as Prime Minister and ran and won the most recent presidential elections, so he's President Erdogan now. Before this happened, it was quite obvious it was going to, and many Turkey-watchers thought that his right-hand man Abdullah Gul would be installed as Prime Minister and good reason to believe that they might try pulling a Putin/Medvedev by switching roles every few years. However, there seems to have been a falling-out between Gul and Erdogan. Ahmet Davutoglu became leader of the party, and thus PM.
The Kurdish parties, however, quite apart from being periodically banned due to alleged links to the PKK, have never been able to reach the 10% threshold. This is partly because the Kurdish vote is split, with religiously conservative Kurds voting for religiously conservative Turkish parties, and secular nationalist Kurds voting for Kurdish parties. So what candidates for the Kurdish parties have traditionally done is run as independents (who are exempt from the 10% threshold) and then, once elected to parliament, operated in a bloc. This is also, I think, part of what has been holding down their percentage of the popular vote.
However, the political situation in Turkey has been shifting with the rise of ISIS and events in Kobane, as well as following the Gezi Park protests two years ago. Turkey is experiencing a crisis in the sheer numbers of the influx of refugees from Syria, which is hitting the south-east quite hard. Many here are disillusioned with the AKP who they think are not handling the crisis effectively. Kurds, even those who traditionally support the AKP, are angry about Turkey's failure to provide military support to Syrian Kurds fighting ISIS in the siege of Kobane. And, finally, the Kurdish movement has -- at least temporarily -- aligned itself with leftists and other minority groups -- Alevis, Laz, Circassians, Nestorian Christians, Arabs, etc -- and particularly with those involved in the Gezi Park protests, under the new banner of the HDP ("People's Democratic Party"). They also benefit from quite a charismatic leader, named Selahattin Demirtas, who actually won 9% of the vote in last year's presidential election.
So, the HDP is, for the first time for a Kurdish party, running as a party, instead of as independents. It's quite a gamble. If they don't meet the threshold, the won't get their seats, which will then go to the second-highest vote-winner in the affected races, which will almost universally be the AKP. Whether they reach the threshold or not could therefore be the difference between whether Erdogan gets the supermajority necessary to make significant constitutional changes, turning Turkey from a parliamentary into a presidential system (ie, significantly increasing his own power), without the need for more than a vote in parliament, or whether he is so few seats short of this that he can't even bring about these changes through a referendum. This in turn could have a significant impact on the conduct of the peace process. Basically, if Erdogan gets his additional presidential powers, he will be able to call the tune of the talks; if not, the Kurds will be in a significantly more powerful position.
So, here I am. The journey's been rather interesting...