Rumored for weeks, an official meeting between Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and main opposition leader Özgür Özel has been scheduled for Thursday, May 2. The meeting comes following heavy losses for Erdoğan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) and historic gains for Özel’s Republican People’s Party (CHP) in local elections one month ago.
The planned meeting between Erdoğan and Özel was confirmed by a CHP spokesperson yesterday (April 29). Expected to take place in Ankara, the meeting’s exact location has yet to be announced.
The two leaders will come to the negotiating table with vastly different agendas. For Erdoğan, a long-planned rewriting of the Turkish constitution will take center stage. While the AKP has been vague on the exact details of a new constitution, the move is seen as a central goal for Erdoğan and follows amendments to Turkey’s existing constitution, such as the controversial 2017 presidential referendum that converted Turkey from a parliamentary to presidential system.
Turkey’s existing constitution was ratified in 1982 following a September 1980 coup d’etat, after which an earlier constitution from 1961 was scrapped.
Changes on presidential term limits, a lowering of the 50% threshold required to win presidential races, limits on LGBT rights, enshrining a woman’s right to wear a headscarf, and the possible declaration of Islam as Turkey’s state religion are all expected to be items on the AKP’s agenda as the party pushes to draft a new document.
Özel is expected to arrive at the meeting to discuss such issues as Turkey’s compliance with Constitutional Court and European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) rulings, debts left by AKP representatives in provinces recently taken over by CHP politicians, and hikes for both minimum wage and pensioner checks.
The AKP’s January decision to strip incarcerated representative-elect Can Atalay of parliamentary status despite rulings by Turkey’s Constitutional Court plunged the country’s judiciary into a constitutional crisis, and Atalay remains in prison. Additionally, opposition figures Selahattin Demirtaş and Osman Kavala remain in prison despite numerous calls from the ECtHR for their release.
Pensioner checks have also been a major topic of late, and Erdoğan’s failure to hike the payments prior to last month’s elections are believed to have been a contributor to the AKP’s dismal showing.
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Today (April 30), Özel met with Turkish Parliament Speaker Numan Kurtulmuş, a member of Erdoğan’s party, in what was seen as a leadup to his meeting with the president. In remarks following the meeting, Özel showed a willingness to engage in talks regarding constitutional change while criticizing the AKP’s failure to abide by rulings from the constitutional court, as seen in the Can Atalay case:
“If we are going to follow the constitution, then let’s change it. Why would one buy a dress not to wear it? Recently, the constitution has not been abided by. Following our existing constitution is our duty. We have communicated the extent to which we value this issue.”
Regarding the AKP’s hopes to draft a new constitution, Kurtulmuş said:
“This parliament has the power to make a new constitution.”
Written/translated for Medyascope by Leo Kendrick
