ERDOĞAN
The prime minister of Turkey has made a policy, indeed a habit, indeed a rather nasty, sneaky habit, of listening to the private conversations of Turkish citizens. Accordingly, he has destroyed many reputations and killed many careers, all on the basis of circumstantial and ill-gotten evidence. He has done this under the guise of protecting the nation from terrorism. To that end, hundreds of those opposed to his regime have been jailed. Many have become seriously ill from their confinement, some have died. And many more live in fear wondering about just who is the terrorist.
Now it is the prime minister’s turn. Wikileaks has lent more smoke to the fire of what has been well and widely known about the Turkish prime minister. Few aside from his most ardent supporters would quibble with the documentary descriptions of him as willful, arrogant, and harsh. And the dimensions of his newly gained wealth, and that of his loyal followers, and their children is of no surprise to anyone marginally alert and living in today’s Turkey.
One trademark of loud-mouthed bullies is that when they are confronted, physically or otherwise, they shut up. Tonight, in the face of a tidal wave of information indicating how corrupt and morally bankrupt he and his minions may be, the prime minister shut up. But his eager nation awaits and deserves a well-considered response. Perhaps when he returns from Libya after receiving the Distinguished Statesman Award from that distinguished statesman and humanitarian Moammar Gadhafi, a fellow leakee? Perhaps then the Turkish prime minister will bless the Turkish nation with his usual eloquence? Like that master of revenge, the Count of Monte Cristo, who summed up all human knowledge in three words, we “wait and hope.”
Cem Ryan
Istanbul
29 November 2010