Alarm raised on Turkey’s drift to authoritarianism

Turkey risks sliding towards “an authoritarian and personal regime” under a constitutional overhaul proposed by Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the president, in the wake of a failed military coup, Europe’s leading human rights watchdog has warned.

In withering criticism of proposals that would reinforce Mr Erdogan’s grip on power, the Council of Europe has said the changes represent a “dangerous step backwards” in Turkey’s democratic tradition.

“The . . . proposed constitutional amendments would introduce in Turkey a presidential regime which lacks the necessary checks and balances to prevent it from becoming an authoritarian one,” said a panel of legal experts at the Strasbourg-based council.

The Venice Commission, a body of experts that advises the council on constitutional matters, said the Turkish president would exercise executive power alone in the new regime, with “unsupervised power” to appoint and dismiss ministers and high officials “on the basis of criteria determined by him or her alone”.

In a draft report seen by the Financial Times, the commission said the president’s power “to dissolve parliament on any grounds whatsoever” was fundamentally alien to democratic presidential systems. Although the president would be obliged in such cases to call early presidential elections, the body said that way of resolving political problems was rudimentary at best.

The president’s power ‘to dissolve parliament on any grounds whatsoever’ [is] fundamentally alien to democratic presidential systems

The draft of the commission’s report, which is to be published on Friday, reflects deepening anxiety about the drift towards authoritarianism in a country that is still officially a candidate for EU membership.

Mr Erdogan’s sweeping clampdown against political opponents after the July plot to overthrow his government has already soured Ankara’s relations with Europe.

Mr Erdogan has blamed the coup attempt on followers of Fethullah Gulen, an exiled cleric. More than 30,000 people have been jailed since the coup attempt and more than 100,000 soldiers, judges, teachers and civil servants have been dismissed or suspended.

The commission — which has no power of sanction — also criticised the timing of next month’s referendum, saying the poll should be postponed until emergency rule introduced after the coup attempt was lifted or restrictions on political freedoms were reversed.

The report also said the proposed changes would weaken already inadequate judicial oversight in Turkey. Enhanced political control over judges and prosecutors was “even more problematic” against the backdrop of longstanding concern about the lack of judicial independence in Turkey, it said.

“The whole process of parliamentary adoption and submission for approval by referendum of the constitutional amendments is taking place during the state of emergency, when very substantive limitations on freedom of expression and freedom of assembly are in force.

“In particular, the extremely unfavourable environment for journalism and the increasingly impoverished and one-sided public debate that prevails in Turkey at this point question the very possibility of holding a meaningful, inclusive democratic referendum campaign.”

The report also criticised the parliamentary debate that led to the adoption of the constitutional amendments, saying it took place when several deputies from the second largest opposition party were in jail.