ANKARA: In a defiant challenge to Turkey’s prime minister, the head of the Constitutional Court complained yesterday of political criticism which he said had traumatised and divided the judiciary.
Hasim Kilic’s uncompromising speech, made in the presence of a grim-looking Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, will exacerbate the tense relationship between the government and judiciary, creating a further headache for Erdogan as he weighs a run for the presidency.
Erdogan has said swathes of Turkey’s lawyers and police are under the sway of his arch-foe, US-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen. He has clashed with judges over a series of rulings.
“To say that the Constitutional Court acts with a political agenda or to blame it for not being patriotic is shallow criticism,” chief judge Kilic told a ceremony broadcast live on local TV channels.
“It is striking that a constitutional ruling has been criticised excessively with political worries,” he said, in a reference to Erdogan’s comment this month that he did not respect the court’s lifting of a government-imposed ban on Twitter.
That ban was seen by Erdogan’s critics as an attempt to halt a string of audio leaks purportedly revealing corruption in the government. Erdogan has branded the audio clips, which he says are “fabricated”, as part of a campaign waged by Gulen and his followers in the judiciary to wreck the government.
Gulen, a former ally of Erdogan’s ruling Islamist-rooted AK Party, denies these claims. Critics say the prime minister is destroying judicial independence and media freedoms in Turkey in a bid to cover up corruption in his inner circle. He rejects that accusation.
Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag struck back at the judge with an accusation that Kilic was acting like a political party and his speech had been heavy on polemics but light on legal ideas.
“The remarks made by the head of the constitutional court show that Turkey has a new opposition,” Bozdag told reporters.
“Apparently the main opposition party and other opposition parties have failed...and our constitutional court head seems to be intent on filling this gap,” he added.
Reuters
