Niyazi Dalyanci
The government of Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan agreed to pull back from the parliament floor the draft legislation that would grant a 44-year lease to the company that clears more than 650,000 land mines that dot the 510-kilometer, 350-meter wide swathe of land along Turkey’s border with Syria.
The operation for clearing the 210 square-kilometer prime agricultural land from mines in exchange for such a long period of land lease on top of the five years estimated to complete the process, led to a debate in which relations with Israel, global land grabbing by rich nations to ensure supply of food and Turkey’s past sins committed against her non-Moslem minorities, got all mixed up thanks to the uniquely preposterous nature of current Turkish political scene.
As of May 2004, Turkey became an official party to the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty that requires clearing of all land mines on its territory by the year 2014.
But how did the seemingly unrelated topics such as global land grabbing for food, relations with Israel and most peculiarly issues like exchange of populations between Turkey and Greece, discriminatory practices against the non-Moslem communities in Turkey since the 19’/20s were thrown into the heated political debate? Israel entered the scene when the Turkish media reported that one of the likely companies to be awarded the mine clearance contract was Israel’s TAHAL that would enter the tender with Turkey’s Calik group where Berat Calik, the son-in-law of Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan is employed as the CEO.
The reports immediately led to dissenting voices questioning the political propriety of leasing such a big swathe of land on the Syrian border to an Israeli company considering the continuing explosive situation in the Middle East.
Some commentators insinuated that Erdogan had probably made promises behind the scenes to the Israelis to mend fences, after the incident in Davos earlier this year where he vented out his wrath against the Israeli President Shimon Peres shouting, “You know only how to kill!” and walked out of a televised panel discussion.
Military offers alternative solution
Meanwhile, the headquarters of the Turkish General Staff also implied disapproval of placing Israel in such a critical location and said it was more appropriate for NATO affiliated NAMSA to take the job of mine clearance. Turkish military sources said that two years ago NAMSA-approved Turkish firm TUSAN AS and its German partner TAUBER cleared a 200,000 square-meter area on the Syrian border of land mines in 26 days without any casualties before the opening of a new border gate between the two countries.
Deniz Baykal, the leader of the main opposition Republican Peoples Party (CHP) called on the deputies of Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) to block the legislation for the tender and said leasing such an agriculturally rich land to foreigners was unacceptable. “You spend 60 million dollars to buy yourself a third private jet but you say there is no money to clear the mines,” said Baykal addressing Erdogan.
Erdogan introduces “past sins of Turkey”
As expected, Erdogan blew his top off again introducing all the wrongdoings in the past against the non-Moslems in Turkey.
“Syria cleared its part of the border and we wanted to do the same and reclaim 210 million square meters of land suitable for organic farming. Immediately, accusations began. They said ‘You are going to make a gift of this land to Israel!’ For decades the same approach persists. How can you say it is a sell out of Turkey just because the global capital that is investing on the land of our country comes from this or that religion? For years certain things have been done in this country. We have kicked out people of different ethnic identities. Did we win in the end? We must think about it.This was the result of fascistic approach. Money has no religion or race. They will invest here and Ahmet, Mehmet and Ayse will find work not Yitzhak,” said Erdogan addressing a local branch congress of his party.
Following Erdogan’s speech, the debate on how to clear the mines took on another dimension.
“Whatever he means, he must say it openly. If we are going to discuss this particular subject, let’s discuss it. But what relation does it have to what we are discussing now,” opposition leader Baykal said.
“The prime minister’s duty is to protect and defend his country. But he seems more inclined to hurt Turkey in order to seem nice to some circles,” Baykal added.
Devlet Bahceli, the leader of rightwing Nationalist Action Party (MHP) was harsher. He said Erdogan’s comments boiled down to insulting the Turkish people and demanded him to apologize from the nation.
Candar:”Erdogan deserves applause”
Erdogan underlined the simple contemporary economic realities by saying that global capital has neither religion nor race, journalist Cengiz Candar wrote in his column in daily Radikal. But by admitting that Turkey has committed wrongdoings against the non-Moslems in the past he “put forward a stunning historical statement” writes Candar.
Candar remembers the late Turgut Ozal’s visit to Athens in 1988 and writes, “When I told him while visiting Phaliron that this neighborhood was set up by the people who came here from Istanbul, he whispered into my ear, ‘We have committed a lot of mistakes against them. I wish we could find a way to bring them back.’ What Ozal whispered into my ear then, Erdogan has declared loudly in front of the masses now.”
Global land grabbing becomes an element of debate too
Although those who approved Erdogan for broaching the subject of Turkey’s past sins against the non-Moslems were not few, those who found his remarks completely irrelevant to the subject under discussion were also in significant numbers.
Milliyet commentator Metin Munir introduced yet another element to the debate claiming that no country in the world has swapped rights of agricultural use of land for clearing land mines.
“Companies operating in the mine clearing business are small and they don’t have the financial means to undertake such a colossal job. They are being subcontracted by giant food and agricultural firms in the world to enter the tender,” writes Munir.
“The job at first sight looks like a tender for clearing the mines but in fact it is a tender for leasing agricultural land. There is a phenomenon where the world is moving in the direction of food shortage. That is why countries like China, South Korea and Saudi Arabia that have accumulated dollar reserves are leasing agricultural lands from African countries such as Ethiopia, Sudan, Ghana and Madagascar,” claims Munir in his article.
Actually, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), an independent organization that collaborates with United Nations agencies supports Munir’s claims. ”Rich countries that are short on land or water at home are looking to secure food-producing lands elsewhere as a way to ensure food security for their populations,” points out Joachim von Braun, director of IFPRI in a recent study titled “’Land Grabbing’ by Foreign Investors in Developing Countries.”
“There is a major lack of transparency in these land deals,” von Braun comments on the IFPRI website.
According to the study, the agricultural land thus acquired by foreign investors in the world is estimated to be between 15 to 20 million hectares.
Erdogan faces dissent also in his home ground
Dissenting voices that are coming from the Islamic media that has been providing unequivocal support to Erdogan must have been more effective in withdrawing the legislation than the criticism of the mainstream commentators.
“Does saying that giving the lands cleared of land mines to Israel for 44 years is not right, mean the same thing as shouting ‘Death to Armenians’ or ‘Greeks out!’? The prime minister’s speech boils down to that,” wrote Hakan Albayrak, a columnist of staunchly pro-government Yeni Safak newspaper.
“I don’t understand how the prime minister sets up such a relationship between the two. There is nothing unusual about him criticizing those who are against foreign capital, but it is very strange for him to represent the presence of Israel, which is the main troublemaker in the Middle East, at a critical area like the Turkish-Syrian border as habitual hostility to foreign capital,” commented Albayrak.
“If reacting to Israel is a fascistic act, then he became a leading fascist when he reacted to Israel in Davos,” Albayrak
concluded.
Ahmet Tasgetiren, another columnist among the supporters of government asks whether prime minister’s stance stems from the need to foot the bill for what he did in Davos against Israel.
Nuh Gonultas, a pro-government Bugun commentator said, “Is it really true that money does not have religion? But they say, who pays the piper calls the tune!”
Although there has been no outward expression of dissent within AKP group of parliamentarians, the talk in Ankara’s political lobbies is that Erdogan faced substantial “foot- dragging” to put the draft legislation on parliament’s agenda. The number of AKP deputies who preferred not to be seen in the assembly was quite noticeable this week.
Although the bill has been withdrawn from the legislative assembly’s floor, it will continue to be discussed in parliamentary commissions in order to reach a compromise solution between rival parties.
“We will seek to draft a new bill on which all the parties can agree,” said Hakki Suha Okay of CHP after the withdrawal of AKP bill.
