After Sunday's ballot, Erdogan could stay in power until 2029

What the Arabic press is saying about the Turkish referendum. Translated by Jennifer Attieh

Turkey's president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, has claimed a narrow victory in a constitutional referendum held on April 16 that granted him sweeping new powers.

According to Arabic-language commentator Ahmed Abou Douh, Turkey was yet another country in a wheelchair before Mr Erdogan became president of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) in 2002.

“Mr Erdogan has undeniably got Turkey to a whole new level since the establishment of modern Turkey in 1923: it has a strong economy, a massive army, a solid infrastructure coupled with an unprecedented investment movement and a transcontinental soft power, apart from being an international tourist destination,” Abou Douh wrote in the London-based pan-Arab newspaper Al Arab.

“But, in return, the president has laid to rest Turkey’s secularism and democracy.”

As such, Mr Erdogan is getting the country back into its wheelchair after lifting it 15 years ago.

“No one dares oppose the new sultan. Even Fethullah Gulen, the founder of the Gulen movement who tried to annul the constitutional amendments through his alliances with the secular parties and the Kurds, has realised that this is the end.”

Abou Douh added that the Turkish president had failed to realise that his people were yet another obstacle in his way. “Going beyond the secular models is not as easy as Mr Erdogan had thought.

“Today he rules a country half of which supports him while the rest opposes him,” he noted.

That said, the writer went on that even a negative outcome of the referendum would not have mattered to Mr Erdogan.

“A thumping ‘yes vote would have turned him into a legitimate sultan, while an emphatic ‘no’ would have maintained his status as an illegitimate sultan.

“In both cases, we would have witnessed the greatest restructuring of the state’s administrative, political, military and economic institutions since Ataturk,” he wrote. “But it is about how much the secular powers of the community accept this inevitable destiny that will predict Turkey’s future.”

Writing in the London-based pan-Arab newspaper Al Hayat, the columnist Jihad El Khazen claimed that the referendum had most certainly been rigged, given that the ruling party controlled all the ballots.

That said, El Khazen noted the wide popularity of the AKP and its president, who had deservingly won previous elections and would most certainly come out victorious in future parliamentary elections.

He added that such popularity has probably induced them into error, from dealing with the Kurds inside Turkey to their foreign relations, particularly with western Europe. “Mr Erdogan has been accused of drifting away from democracy, out of his desire to build a neo-Ottoman empire.”

According to El Khazen, the Turkish referendum with a “yes” or a “no” vote was the easiest one in the world. But he argued that by no means does the simplicity of the referendum reflect the approval of its outcome.

“The office of the prime minister will be abolished and the president will issue decrees, approve the budget and appoint 12 out of 15 judges to the Constitutional Court that considers the legitimacy of decrees.

“The president is elected for a five-year term and is eligible to contest a re-election. He can run for re-election again if the parliament suspends or annuls his second tenure, which means that he could stay in office for four out of the five years of his second tenure that will then be annulled and he will get another five-year term, hence a total of 14 years in office,” El Khazen wrote.

“In fact, Mr Erdogan’s rule could extend until 2029, without the need to circumvent the law,” he concluded.

‘ Erdogan has been accused of drifting away from democracy, out of his desire to build a neo-Ottoman empire