Dr. Khalid Al-Shafi
Turkey has entered a new era of power-sharing and changes after the results of the recent election. The Arab world is watching developments in Turkey keenly because they will have an impact on the ongoing conflicts in the region — in Syria, Iraq, Libya, Egypt and Palestine. Ankara’s relations with the GCC states are also under focus.
The setback to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his party came as a surprise, even to Erdogan. He was looking forward to making amendments to the constitution to change the political order in the country from parliamentary to presidential system. Erdogan and his party missed an absolute majority after 13 years of powerful rule.
Whatever the implications of the results, the real winner is Turkish democracy which prevented the president from becoming a new Sultan by changing the system from a parliamentary set-up with limited power to a presidential system where he will have huge powers, which can lead to his acquiring tendencies of an authoritarian regime.
Since 2002, the Justice and Development Party (JDP) introduced itself to the world as a new model of a moderate, enlightened Islamic party which believes in democracy and economic development. Turkey’s economy galloped under its rule, ranking 17th internationally and sixth in Europe.
The party, which used to win majority in elections, also succeeded in bringing the Kurdish, who were fighting the state to share power, into the mainstream and maintained stability amid the chaos engulfing the region.
The president and his party supported the Syrian revolution, opened the country’s borders for the Syrian refugees, opposed the military coup in Egypt against former president Mohammed Mursi and continued support for the Palestinian cause.
The election was a unique experiment that saw the participation of all factions. Let’s hope Turkey will not stop the democratic transformation process along the European lines, and will become one of five major economies of the world by 2020. The Peninsula
