Turkey's Erdogan's pro-Islamist Government is being rattled by corruption involving even the son of the PM.
In a late-night news conference after an unscheduled meeting with President Abdullah Gul, Mr. Erdogan fired a fourth minister and announced a broad new cabinet lineup. He ignored the earlier parting shot from Mr. Bayraktar: "To soothe the nation, I believe that the prime minister should resign, too."
The unusual upheaval in the governing Justice and Development Party, or AKP, underscores mounting challenges facing Mr. Erdogan ahead of a lengthy election cycle that starts in March.
Though Mr. Erdogan and his Islamist-leaning party often have clashed with traditionally secular institutions such as the military, the latest trouble appears to reflect a power struggle inside the AKP itself, rather than a fight over the country's orientation.
But Mr. Erdogan has been on the defensive since Dec. 17, when prosecutors unveiled a wide-ranging corruption investigation targeting dozens of his allies in politics and business. Prosecutors have said they plan to charge at least 24 suspects still being detained on accusations of bribery, money laundering, gold smuggling and other alleged misdeeds.
The AKP dominates Turkish politics, with public support holding steady at 50% as of October. But the prime minister's supporters seem to have fallen out with a faction loyal to a former ally, Fethullah Gulen, whose millions of followers helped elect Mr. Erdogan three times.
The Turkish cleric who has a "protected status by the US" lives in Pennsylvania, but his influence is widely believed to extend into the rank-and-file in Turkey's police and judiciary.
The government's response to the corruption probe has escalated tensions.
Before quitting as interior minister, Mr. Guler had purged about 100 security chiefs from top posts in the police department, accusing them of having failed to notify superiors about the probe. Mr. Erdogan also pushed through a measure that bars prosecutors from conducting investigations without informing their superiors.
The moves drew a rebuke from Mr. Gulen, the cleric in Pennsylvania, who lashed out in his speech posted online at "those who don't see the thief but go after those trying to catch the thief."
On the corruption scale Turkey scores very poorly. Perhaps the most widely used measure of comparative levels of corruption across different countries- Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index 2013 version of the index, Turkey ranked the 55th out of 177 and is almost halfway between Sweden (tied for 3rd) and Moldova (tied for 102nd).
With Turkey’s economic growth having in the past few years (although perhaps ticking up in 2013), this suggests that Erdogan’s position could turn out to be quite precarious compared to a PM in a low corruption Nordic country, and he probably should have good reasons to be concerned.
EU-Digest
In a late-night news conference after an unscheduled meeting with President Abdullah Gul, Mr. Erdogan fired a fourth minister and announced a broad new cabinet lineup. He ignored the earlier parting shot from Mr. Bayraktar: "To soothe the nation, I believe that the prime minister should resign, too."
The unusual upheaval in the governing Justice and Development Party, or AKP, underscores mounting challenges facing Mr. Erdogan ahead of a lengthy election cycle that starts in March.
Though Mr. Erdogan and his Islamist-leaning party often have clashed with traditionally secular institutions such as the military, the latest trouble appears to reflect a power struggle inside the AKP itself, rather than a fight over the country's orientation.
But Mr. Erdogan has been on the defensive since Dec. 17, when prosecutors unveiled a wide-ranging corruption investigation targeting dozens of his allies in politics and business. Prosecutors have said they plan to charge at least 24 suspects still being detained on accusations of bribery, money laundering, gold smuggling and other alleged misdeeds.
The AKP dominates Turkish politics, with public support holding steady at 50% as of October. But the prime minister's supporters seem to have fallen out with a faction loyal to a former ally, Fethullah Gulen, whose millions of followers helped elect Mr. Erdogan three times.
The Turkish cleric who has a "protected status by the US" lives in Pennsylvania, but his influence is widely believed to extend into the rank-and-file in Turkey's police and judiciary.
The government's response to the corruption probe has escalated tensions.
Before quitting as interior minister, Mr. Guler had purged about 100 security chiefs from top posts in the police department, accusing them of having failed to notify superiors about the probe. Mr. Erdogan also pushed through a measure that bars prosecutors from conducting investigations without informing their superiors.
The moves drew a rebuke from Mr. Gulen, the cleric in Pennsylvania, who lashed out in his speech posted online at "those who don't see the thief but go after those trying to catch the thief."
On the corruption scale Turkey scores very poorly. Perhaps the most widely used measure of comparative levels of corruption across different countries- Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index 2013 version of the index, Turkey ranked the 55th out of 177 and is almost halfway between Sweden (tied for 3rd) and Moldova (tied for 102nd).
With Turkey’s economic growth having in the past few years (although perhaps ticking up in 2013), this suggests that Erdogan’s position could turn out to be quite precarious compared to a PM in a low corruption Nordic country, and he probably should have good reasons to be concerned.
EU-Digest
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