Editorial: Turkiye sliding into autocracy

Over the last few years, Erdogan’s regime has turned increasingly dictatorial, chipping away at the democratic checks and balances, silencing the media, replacing elected mayors with bureaucrats, controlling the judiciary and manipulating elections

The growing civil unrest across Turkiye, marked by the spontaneous eruption of fierce anti-government demonstrations and the subsequent brutal crackdown on dissidents, reflects a clear slide towards authoritarianism. In power since 2003, Turkish strongman Recep Tayyip Erdogan has been tightening his hold on a country plagued by economic crisis, shoddy governance and widespread corruption. The pugnacious leader, pursuing a muscular brand of political Islam, has been ruling the country with an iron fist focused on a religious-nationalist and conservative agenda. Over the last few years, Erdogan’s regime has turned increasingly dictatorial, chipping away at the democratic checks and balances, silencing the media, replacing elected mayors with bureaucrats, sidelining the legislature, controlling the judiciary and manipulating elections. The large-scale arrests of protesters and journalists in recent months have sent a chilling message that no one is safe in the country and that votes can be nullified and freedoms can be stripped away in an instant. The tipping point came with the recent arrest of the popular Mayor of Istanbul Ekrem Imamoglu on charges of corruption. Imamoğlu, a member of the opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) who has won two successive mayoral elections, is widely seen as a political challenger to Erdoğan. In fact, the main opposition party recently chose him as its candidate for the next presidential election, due in 2028. The day before his arrest, Imamoglu’s university degree was cancelled by Istanbul University, which said it was falsely obtained. Having a valid degree is a prerequisite to running for President.

If convicted in the corruption case, he could be barred from standing in the presidential race. The arrest triggered public anger with protestors hitting the streets across the country and calling for the government’s resignation. The authorities have launched a massive crackdown, arresting over 1,400 protestors, while Erdogan described the public reaction as an ‘evil movement of violence’. Though the constitutional term limits preclude him from running again for the presidency in 2028, there are fears that Erdogan could change the constitution to remain in power. He has entrenched his position over the last two decades, projecting himself as a saviour of Islam and abandoning the secular ethos of the country’s founder Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. Freedom and democracy have been steadily eroded in his regime. After surviving a coup attempt in 2016, he turned his presidency into an ever more powerful executive role, and cracked down on his opponents and dissent. His muscular diplomacy has riled allies in Europe and beyond. A strong supporter of the rights of Turks to express their religion more openly, Erdogan favoured criminalising adultery and repeatedly asserted that no Muslim family should consider birth control or family planning. “We will multiply our descendants,” he had famously said in 2016. Positioning himself as a champion of Islamist causes, he has extolled motherhood, condemned feminists, and said men and women cannot be treated equally.