Turkish Daily News, 96-06-17
From: Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs <http://www.mfa.gov.tr>
TURKISH DAILY NEWS
17 June 1996
CONTENTS
[01] Ciller: No comeback for Yilmaz
[02] Longest week begins for Erbakan and Ciller
[01] Ciller: No comeback for Yilmaz
Turkish Daily News
ANKARA- A vindictive True Path Party (DYP) leader Tansu
Ciller on Sunday declared caretaker Prime Minister Mesut Yilmaz
to be at the end of his rope while members of her party expressed
conflicting views regarding her plans to enter a substitute coalition
with the Islamists.
"I have said before that Yilmaz will go; now I say he will
go without any chance of return," Ciller said, unleashing
a verbal barrage against her center-right rival and former government
partner.
Ciller on Friday staged a radical policy shift and held coalition
talks with Chairman Necmettin Erbakan of the pro-Islamic Welfare
Party (RP) after the DYP opted to end the coalition partnership
with Yilmaz's Motherland Party (ANAP) which backed corruptions
probes against her.
She charged that although she had allowed Yilmaz to take the first
turn at the head of the now-defunct coalition following the Dec.
24 election, Yilmaz had stabbed her in the back and accused her
former coalition partners of acting "as if they were an enemy
force, as if they were launched on a crusade."
In Friday's talks with the RP leader, Ciller reportedly dropped
her insistence on briefly leading the coalition to calm the military's
-- denied -- misgivings about seeing Islamists in power.
But Ciller, who earlier championed a four-party coalition, including
two left-wing parties beside the DYP and ANAP, reserved her final
say to Thursday, saying the DYP's competent bodies had to approve
the deal with the Islamists first.
President Suleyman Demirel, also in Eskisehir on a weekend tour,
cautioned against public disillusionment with the democratic mechanisms,
saying the country's parliamentary system was functioning.
He said if the sides could not come to him with a viable formula
by July 22, he was vested with constitutional powers to appoint
a caretaker government and call for new elections.
Despite Ciller's confidence about taming the opposition of DYP
deputies frowning upon the partnership with the RP after an election
campaign based on the defense of secularism and confrontation
with Erbakan's Islamism, the reservations reportedly continue.
Dogan Gures, the former chief of general staff and now a DYP deputy,
on Sunday issued an impassioned plea to the DYP, ANAP as well
as the Democratic Left Party (DSP) and the Republican People's
Party (CHP) to agree on a four-party coalition "under a prime
minister acceptable to all."
Although avoiding a direct assault on Ciller's talks with Erbakan,
the former military chief said he was unhappy with certain views
of the RP regarding the country's constitutional order, although
he granted that it was a democratically elected party.
Meanwhile, Esat Kiratlioglu, a leading aide to Ciller, said he
was warm to the idea of a coalition partnership with the RP, discounting
any crisis for the DYP if the deal were finalized.
But one deputy has already resigned from the DYP to join Yilmaz's
ANAP after Ciller began her flirtation with Erbakan and many others
have threatened to cast no-confidence votes.
[02] Longest week begins for Erbakan and Ciller
Tuesday's developments will affect Ciller's reply to Erbakan
on Thursday
By Kemal Balci
TDN Parliament Bureau
ANKARA- The week ahead will determine the outcome of the
coalition proposal which Welfare Party (RP) leader Necmettin Erbakan,
who has the mandate to form Turkey's next government, has made
to True Path Party (DYP) Chairwoman Tansu Ciller.
Before she agrees to participate in a government to be formed
under Erbakan's premiership, Ciller first wants the RP's backing
in avoiding the parliamentary probes regarding her alleged misspending
of the Prime Ministry slush fund. She will later try to convince
her party's parliamentary group and general administration board
about Erbakan's premiership. In return for obstructing the Democratic
Left Party's (DSP) slush fund probe against Ciller, Erbakan will
ask for closure of the Mercumek file with the DYP's backing. He
will also want the DYP to join the coalition.
In order to hinder the possible RP-DYP coalition, Motherland Party
(ANAP) leader Mesut Yilmaz will call for the vote on the extension
of the Operation Provide Comfort mandate to be held again. Following
an appeal by the RP, the Constitutional Court had earlier cancelled
this vote. With such a move, ANAP intends to create the first
rift between the RP and the DYP prior to their forming a coalition.
During her half-hour tete-a-tete with Erbakan last week, Ciller
said she would not oppose a DYP-RP coalition, as she had before,
in principle. She said that she would have the issue evaluated
by the relevant institutions within her party. She said she would
be making the most difficult decision of her life in deciding
whether to back an Erbakan-led government, and added that she
expected developments which would result in the persuasion of
her DYP group and party administration.
Ciller will wait to see the RP's stance in the debate on the DSP
motion calling for a parliamentary inquiry into the allegations
regarding the prime ministry slush fund. She will use this debate
to determine whether the confidence which two parties need to
form a coalition exists between the RP and the DYP. If the RP
deputies vote against the motion, Ciller will have received her
first indication that this confidence exists. During the DYP group
meeting to be held on the same day, Ciller will convince her deputies,
who will be hoping for ministerial jobs, by telling them that
the majority of the ministers will be from the DYP. During the
general administration board meeting on Wednesday, Ciller will
evaluate the issue for the last time and on the following day
she will inform Erbakan of her final decision.
The most serious potential threat to Ciller's plan is the anti-RP
declaration which her opponents within the DYP are considering
issuing. If the number of DYP deputies signing this declaration
reaches 20, this will make it impossible for an RP-DYP government
to win a vote of confidence.
In return for rescuing Ciller from the parliamentary probe, with
DYP backing Erbakan will try to get rid of the inquiry into his
party's links with Suleyman Mercumek. Mercumek was found guilty
of corruption relating to aid money collected for Bosnia.
In the face of this positive dialogue between Ciller and Erbakan,
ANAP leader Yilmaz will on Tuesday call for Parliament to repeat
the vote on the extension of the Operation Provide Comfort mandate.
The first crack is expected to emerge between the potential coalition
partners should the RP oppose the extension while the DYP favors
it. If the RP casts its votes against the extension, the DYP will
seem to have become enmeshed from the very outset in the extreme
complications which such a coalition will necessarily involve.
Regardless of the outcome of the vote, the issue of extending
the Operation Provide Comfort mandate will return to the agenda
after June. DYP deputies, who will be shaken by an RP "no"
vote, are thought likely to try to force their party into a new
Motherpath government, and to ensure that the reply given to the
RP on Thursday is negative.
Following a series of critical decisions to be made on Tuesday,
the decision which the DYP's highest authorities are likely to
reach will also become clearer. Thus the reply which Ciller will
give to Erbakan on Thursday will be definite on Wednesday. The
longest week is starting but, as a Turkish expression says, "the
coming of Thursday will be certain from Wednesday" -- meaning
one can tell what will happen on Thursday by looking at the developments
of Wednesday.
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