Failed to take the chair of the fascist Nationalist Movement Party due to a Turkish court’s cancellation of an extraordinary congress, Meral Akşener, an ultranationalist veteran politician, is rapidly continuing her efforts to form a new and "centrist" political party with the slogan of "restoration of Turkish politics" against President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
Suffering from harsh political confrontations and instabilities, Turkey witnesses significant problems within the bourgeois political establishment as Erdoğan has enjoyed his unrivalled status in Turkish politics for a long time.
Following failed military coup in July 2016, a state of emergency was declared, and Turkey’s political structure shifted from parliamentary system to an executive presidency through the fraudulent April 16 constitutional referendum.
During the referendum process, the fascist Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), currently the fourth largest party in the parliament, declared to support Erdoğan’s 'yes' campaign. Prior to the referendum, the congress request of a dissident group within the ultra-nationalist MHP party was prevented with the initiative of existing party leader Devlet Bahçeli who also took the support of Erdoğan.
As the dissident group failed to hold a congress for electing a new leader, it split from the MHP with the aim of founding a new political party under the lead of Meral Akşener, a long-time politician and former Interior Minister in Turkish politics.
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The Akşener group’s emergence as a new political centre in Turkish politics has pleased those who make plans to receive votes from the electoral base of ruling AKP party, while the pro-government media feverishly criticizes the Akşener movement. Furthermore, despite Akşener is a notorious ultranationalist figure, even some "left-wing" forces attribute a key role to her steps so as to weaken the AKP and prevent Erdoğan’s plans to be an unrivalled strongman within an executive presidency system in Turkey.
As the parliamentary main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) has congratulated and wished good luck for Akşener and her fellows in their political life, she always became a "shining star" in Turkish establishment whenever the bourgeois politics experienced crises and problems. Coming to the fore with her varying political discourse at different periods depending upon the needs of the capitalist order, Akşener has always remained a racist, reactionary and pro-market political figure in the country.
Moreover, Akşener participated in Erdoğan's AKP party as well. Afterwards, she "restored" her ultranationalist soul, changing her route to the fascist MHP party. Those years also saw her eulogies for the Islamic Gülenist organization, which later became one of the masterminds of the July 15 coup attempt in 2016.
Following the general election of June 2015, MHP leader Bahçeli did not allow her nomination in the party's list of candidate lawmakers. She started to organize a dissident group within the MHP as the Bahçeli leadership backed Erdoğan. Able to read the imperialist centres' project to see "an AKP party without Erdoğan" and/or "a new and controllable right-wing party", Akşener has come to the fore again as a rising political figure in Turkey.
ULTRANATIONALIST FIGURE IN THE 1990s
Having entered politics in the 1990s, Akşener became a lawmaker from the True Path Party (DYP) under the lead of then-Prime Minister Tansu Çiller, at a time when Turkey witnessed murders by "unknown" assailants and massacres of some gangs under the supervision of the government.
Following the 'Susurluk scandal', involving the close relationship between the Turkish government, the armed forces and organized criminal groups, which surfaced with a car crash in November 1996, Akşener became interior minister to cover the government’s direct role in the scandal. One of the figures who died in the car crash that revealed the scandal, was Abdullah Çatlı, a fascist leader who had been recruited during the anti-communist campaign in Turkey in the Cold War era. As an ultranationalist politician, Akşener is known to have a close relation with Çatlı and many other fascist murderers.
Furthermore, the infamous scandal showed the dark side of the capitalist order, revealing that Turkey had been governed by some Gladio, or "deep state", apparatus which committed murders and unlawful acts. Meral Akşener played a big role in the restoration of the Turkish politics at that time.
Having never denied her past deeds, Akşener said in recent times: "During my office of Interior Ministry, I had undersigned the longest, widest and most extensive cross-border operation in [Turkish] history. It is embarrassing that some say on social media, 'Meral Akşener should not be the chair of MHP, she is the responsible for the murders by unknown assailants'. No matter what you say, I accept everything. I did whatever required for this country and for the unity of this nation, I am taking all the responsibility."
AKŞENER BECAME AN ISLAMIST AND GÜLEN SUPPORTER WHEN NECESSARY
During the 1997 military memorandum, which is also called a "post-modern coup" by some circles, when the military forced the resignation of Islamist Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan, one of the forefathers of political Islam and Erdoğan’s movement, and his coalition government, Akşener followed a "moderate" policy, indicating to the danger of religious cults on the one hand, raising criticism over the military on the other.
Having danced to another tune all the time with regard to the actual needs of capitalist order in Turkey, Meral Akşener commercialized her stance "against" the military tutelage after military’s memorandum on February 28, 1997, under the mask of "apostle of democracy" against various military coups in Turkish political history.
When the capitalist order needed to increase Islamism in Turkey, she appeared as an Islamist. She voiced out her Islamist tendencies when she was telling about her memories: "[During the February 28 military memorandum] a women group was holding a rally, they were shouting 'Down with sharia!'. In my belief, sharia means Islam. As a religious person, I would not have allowed them to shout that. 'Shout against the government, but not that one,' I said. However, some of them shouted it. I would like to erase that night from my life. I felt an inexpressible agony."
Some sources accuse Akşener of taking the support of the network of U.S.-based Islamic preacher Fethullah Gülen. Is it possible that such a reactionary network in Turkey sponsored by the U.S. and other imperialists did not have any sort of link to pro-establishment politicians such as Akşener?
When Gülenism was a mainstream tendency, she gave a speech during the International Turkish Olympiads, a Gülenist network-led event that was also greeted by Erdoğan at the time. She mostly visited daily Zaman, the Gülenist newspaper. She appeared on a photo frame with Erdoğan during the 25th-anniversary event of daily Zaman. She even stated, "If Fethullah Gülen’s interfaith dialogue model had been implemented before the year of 1980, those people from the left and right wings would not have died."
Nowadays, Akşener is promoted as a "saviour" against Erdoğan’s model despite her infamous political career. As the so-called left-wing gives up the strategy of a total change of political order and thus resorts to bourgeois political elements, even Akşener is portrayed as the "hope" of people. Just like the recent past’s manoeuvre of nominating Islamist candidates against AKP party, ultranationalist Akşener emerges as a new version of the "challenge" to Erdoğan.
