Turkey’s constitution will guarantee secularism: PM

Police fire tear-gas, rubber bullets to disperse protesters

Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu vowed Wednesday that Turkey’s draft constitution would guarantee secularism, after calls for a religious charter sparked controversy in the predominantly Muslim country.

“Secularism will feature in the new constitution we draft as a principle that guarantees citizens’ freedom of religion and faith and that ensures the state is at an equal distance from all faith groups,” Davutoglu said in a televised speech.

He said Turkey’s secular and democratic character was “not up for debate” under the rule of the Justice and Development Party (AKP), which has been in power since 2002.

Parliament Speaker Ismail Kahraman on Monday said the country “must have a religious constitution”, triggering fears that the AKP government was seeking to Islamise the traditionally secular country.

The call led to protests on Tuesday in major cities where police fired tear-gas and rubber bullets to disperse demonstrators in Ankara and Istanbul.

Kahraman’s comments also drew fire from opposition parties, prompting the speaker to release a statement saying he had been expressing his own opinion, not that of the AKP of which he is a member.

The separation of religion from state affairs is one of the fault lines in Turkish society.

The founder of modern Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, based the post-Ottoman republic on a strict separation between religion and state.

Opponents have voiced concerns over a rapid Islamisation of society after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a pious Muslim, won the presidency in August 2014 following over a decade as prime minister which saw a greater emphasis placed on religion in Turkish life.

Cigdem Toker, columnist for the opposition Cumhuriyet daily, suggested that the parliament speaker’s appeal was a “declaration of intention” regardless of the government’s attempts to distance itself from his comments.

“It is a new threshold in the process of regulating all basic rights and freedoms from the education system to working life on the basis of religion,” she wrote.

Selin Sayek Boke, spokesman for the main opposition pro-secular CHP party, slammed Kahraman’s “defiant” comments, urging him to quit.

“To us secularism is a red line and a cause that we’ll defend until one single CHP member remains alive,” she said. “Parliament Speaker must urgently resign.” Erdogan said during a visit to Zagreb on Tuesday that the state was at an equal distance between all religion groups and all beliefs.

Over the past few years, the AKP government has lifted a long-standing ban on women and girl wearing religious headscarf in schools and the civil service as part of a democratic reform package.