Turkey's Constitutional Court has just banned Democratic Society Party (DTP). The decision has been made unanimously by top judges, including the ones who rejected a similar case against the governing AKP.
After inspecting dozens of evidences for two years, the court has decided that DTP has become the political wing of PKK, a terrorist organization according to the United States and the EU. The relationship between PKK and DTP is similar to the one between ETA and Batasuna, the court rules.
At the same time, the court didn't kick all DTP MPs out 0f the national parliament. Yes, 55 DTP members have been barred from politics, but the remaining 19 in the parliament can easily attract only one more MP to form another parliamentary group under the flag of a new party. If they're responsible politicians and not terrorist provocateurs, then that's what they should do.
What was wrong with this court decision is about some DTP politicians who were surprisingly barred from joining any political party for five years. For instance, alongside 34 members of the party, DTP official Aysel Tugluk (right) was also banned. It is true that she couldn't manage to distance DTP from PKK by herself, but she had tried to do so. She was actually a rare example of doves in DTP. It is unjust that she has also been banned, while a PKK militant named Emine Ayna is still allowed to be in politics.
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Banning a party is not an ideal situation in a democracy, but sometimes it is necessary. As I've written a few days ago, I agree with the prosecution. I had said that a ban could be counter-productive for political stability in the short term, but the judiciary should not think about politics. It should serve the justice, blindly, by basing its decision solely on current laws and norms.
It is DTP which made Turkey lose an indispensable opportunity by not distancing itself from terrorism. Recently, it has undoubtedly become the mouthpiece of PKK. Their constant efforts to relate the Kurdish Opening of the government to the fate of Abdullah Ocalan, the terrorist leader who serves a life sentence in an isolated island, were the last nails that they put in their own coffin.
What was wrong with this court decision is about some DTP politicians who were surprisingly barred from joining any political party for five years. For instance, alongside 34 members of the party, DTP official Aysel Tugluk (right) was also banned. It is true that she couldn't manage to distance DTP from PKK by herself, but she had tried to do so. She was actually a rare example of doves in DTP. It is unjust that she has also been banned, while a PKK militant named Emine Ayna is still allowed to be in politics.
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On the other hand, I believe that there is a potential of utilitiarism in this decision as a whole. Even though the effect of this move would surely be negative in the short term, it may be positive in the long one. Let me explain:
In such a unique, but fragile democracy like Turkey, banning radical parties generally serve the long term national interests by taming their political bases and elites.
Remember Turkish Islamists...
Welfare Party was a fanatically-Islamist organization, which was once talking about imposing sharia law in Turkey. After it was closed down with the confirmation of the European Court of Human Rights, a more moderate party, namely Virtue Party, has been born out of its ashes. Virtue Party had also got some radical Islamists, which were all eliminated after a second ban. Finally, we have come to AKP and now its leader Tayyip Erdogan is miraculously condemning his previous statements, defending that he has been changed.
I hope that a similar change will happen to pro-Kurdish politicians after this legal and totally justified decision, prompting them to condemn PKK terrorism and keep themselves away from Kurdish nationalism, which is as destructive as any hardcore nationalisms in the world. Maybe they can finally learn to be the party of whole Turkey and whole Kurds, not just a terrorist faction. As the Turkish saying goes; "sometimes a catastrophe is better than a friendly advice."
