Cyprus-Forum.com

[paaul12]

As Ecevit's era comes to a close
Wednesday, November 8, 2006


Efforts to find out which era comes to a close with Ecevit’s funeral may provide us with glimpse to the future.

Murat Yetkin

The state funeral of former Prime Minister Bülent Ecevit and his burial in the state cemetery, through a legal amendment by the government, will mark the symbolic end of an era.

This political era reached its peak after the Cyprus operation in 1974 in the second half of the 1970s and was suspended for some time with the military coup in 1980. Due to its forced suspension, it never came to a close on its own dynamics. This era had four principal actors. Süleyman Demirel represented the center right and Necmettin Erbakan led religious politics. There was Turkish nationalist Alparslan Türkeş and, of course, the natural leader of the Turkish left, Bülent Ecevit.

All four were politically devastated by the 1980 military coup. Their parties were closed and they were put on trial. They were banned from politics but returned once the bans were lifted. Their return prevented the closure of the old political era and became an obstacle that kept new generations of politicians from finding a voice.

The ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) was able to break this deadlock only after severing its links with Erbakan. True Path Party (DYP) leader Mehmet Ağar's failure to cut his connections with the old Justice Party (AP) and the DYP clique are preventing him from attracting new blood.

With the death of Türkeş, Devlet Bahçeli took over leadership of the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) and is managing the party with people who previously were Motherland Party (ANAVATAN) or DYP members. He also doesn't allow new-generation politicians, for example, Ümit Özdağ, to take over the lead.

In its present form, ANAVATAN is far from being a center of attraction for the new generation.

In other words, the biggest damage the 1980 coup inflicted on politics, besides the loss of self confidence, was its eradication of the mechanisms of renewal.

The only movement that was able to free itself from this deadlock until now has been the AKP.

On the left, if we have to note a strategic mistake Ecevit made, we can define it as his acts that estranged all those groups on the left that worked for him and supported him in the 1973 and even 1977 elections by writing �Kara Oğlan� (Dark Boy) everywhere.

There were three consequences of his action. One is the fact that the Republican People's Party (CHP) or any other leftist movement can now only dream of attaining close to 40 percent support in the elections. The CHP and the movements that sprang from it looked old and exclusive.

The second fact is the leftist groups that found a place for themselves within the system through their support for Ecevit could not hold on and were flung to the periphery.

This resulted in feeding the vicious circle of violence that dominated the country towards the 1980 coup.

(A question we may ask here is whether the efforts of the Turkish Communist Party (TKP), which was under the influence of Moscow at the time, to conquer the CHP and the Confederation of Revolutionary Workers' Unions (DİSK) from within had anything to do with the eventual outcome. Did the TKP efforts to sever the CHP and DİSK's links from other leftist groups result in a defensive reaction by Ecevit and his group?)

The third factor is just a possibility. If the CHP kept cutting its links with the leftist groups that fed it, could it have transformed into a huge umbrella party like the Democratic Party in the United States or the British Labour Party, where every leftist group can find itself a niche? Could this have prevented the circle of violence on the eve of the coup? Would the coup still have happened? Could Turgut Özal's economic reforms be implemented by an AP that dominated the center right in a democratic environment? These are questions that are based on assumptions, but they still need to be asked.

We may be able to find the answers to these questions by looking into the factors that resulted in the Democratic Left Party's (DSP) choice to become a party without an organization and the reasons why the CHP, led by Deniz Baykal, failed to attract any new blood. There are young politicians within the DSP, but the leadership is preventing them from becoming organized. They are frightened of being taken over from within. In the CHP, members are experienced, but their experience is of being in opposition. New politicians who may be able to lead them to victory can never make it to the top.

If we return to the beginning of the article, we can say Ecevit was an honest, polite politician who courageously resisted all pressure. He was a symbol and a statesman. An era will end with his funeral. We'll see whether a new era will begin. This is something those who are towards the left of center need to find out.



© 2005 Dogan Daily News Inc. www.turkishdailynews.com.tr

[saravakos]

dear oh dear...so much hatred and venom
millions mourn a death of a hero while millions of others celebrate the same death.
it's a funny old world - the chinese call it 'ying and yang',i call it 'bullshit'.

i call it real life

[Swashbuckler]

You said that "Ecevit acted under the treaty of guarantee - therefore legally." Totally wrong!

Both the Junta coup and the Turkish invasion were illegal interventions into an independed, sovereign, UN member country. They were both done arbitrarily, contrary to the provisions of the UN Charter which stipulates that only the UN Security Council can authorize an intervention into a Sovereign UN member country (Cyprus.) The Junta coup against elected president Makarios was ordered by seconded, but legally appointed Greek officers in the NG, and therefore it can be classed as an illegal intervention, but not an invasion in the literal sense, since no Greek troops violently landed in Cyprus to occupy its territory. The Turkish illegal intervention was an illegal invasion, because it was made by Turkish troops violently landing in Cyprus, which regardless of the fact that came only 5 days after the illegal Junta coup and hypothetically as a response to it, it was illegal because there was no UN SC approval or authorization for it, as the UN Charter (the ultimate pinnacle of international law) stipulates.

Up till here you're wrong - the treaty of guarantee was agreed expressly to protect Cyprus' sovereignty. Therefore - to prevent union with Greece and the usurpation of the Cypriot "government" Turkey acted legally. That they should have acted in 1963 to prevent GC usurpation of the 1960 constitution is also a point to bear in mind. That actions AFTER the intervention may have been outside this remit and therefore law is open to debate.


About Makarios been a corrupt power-crazed loon …who says so …You? Uncle Rauf bey? Harry Gibbons in his “genocide files?” Michael Moran? Kenan Atakol? The Turkish foreign ministry’s website? The ATCA websites? Who else? Ayse?

As for your other nonsense above, in which you asked “how come those same fascists and enosisists were in charge so long or had a free reign to do what they wanted?” and claimed also that “they were voted in by a majority- ergo Makarios the enosisist (and now Big Nose Papadoc,)” I would advise you read some more authoritative resources -outside and away from those the ATCA websites provide for you! None of these people were in charge, set aside that they have never been voted in by any majority or even a minority. If they were in charge, they wouldn’t have had the need to overthrow with a coup the one that was voted in to have been in charge (Makarios.) You see …your little nonsense theories do not even fit from a logical perspective.

This goes to prove typical GC nonsense about how the Cyprob only started in 1974. For TCs it began in 1963. Successive GC governments, under one ethnarch, carried out policies of discrimination - both explicit and implicit - against TCs. These were democratically elected governments so were the GCs willing collaborators in this discrimination? Probably. Which is why we continue to demand provisions that guarantee our security and freedom. That Makarios began to change his tune after 1972 necessitated the coup against him as far as Hellenists were concerned only absolves him of his rascism as far as the period from then until 1974 is concerned. Prior to that he was an absolutist bigot.

[Kifeas]

Up till here you're wrong - the treaty of guarantee was agreed expressly to protect Cyprus' sovereignty. Therefore - to prevent union with Greece and the usurpation of the Cypriot "government" Turkey acted legally. That they should have acted in 1963 to prevent GC usurpation of the 1960 constitution is also a point to bear in mind. That actions AFTER the intervention may have been outside this remit and therefore law is open to debate.

Swashbuckler, CHAPTER XVI, article 103 of the UN Charter ( http://www.un.org/aboutun/charter ) states the following:

"In the event of a conflict between the obligations of the Members of the United Nations under the present Charter and their obligations under any other international agreement, their obligations under the present Charter shall prevail."

Therefore, the 1960 treaty of guarantee is subject and subordinate to the provisions of the UN Charter, in the case in which there is a conflict between the Charter and the treaty. The UN Charter stipulates that no unilateral intervention against the sovereignty and territorial integrity of another country is allowed by any UN member country (i.e. signatory of the Charter,) without prior discussion of the dispute within the UN SC and international diplomatic mediation, and without prior authorisation by the UN SC of any sort of military or other intervention. (Read UN Charter: Chapter I, articles 1 & 2; Chapter V, articles 24 & 25; Chapter VI, articles 33-38 and Chapter VII, articles 39-42.)

Read the above and tell us here whether Turkey’s (a signatory of the UN Charter) invasion in 1974, and subsequent occupation, were within the parameters of the UN Charter, or whether it was made contrary to it, and therefore in violation of international law, the pinnacle of whom is the UN Charter. (
http://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/index.ph ... tional_law )

[turboturk]

The man is dead , can we let him be. for gods sake..
enough is enough
He is part of a history that some people see him as a great man,
and some people want to shit on his grave,(thats really adult of you)
Just let him be.

move on...

[Piratis]

The man is dead , can we let him be. for gods sake..
enough is enough
He is part of a history that some people see him as a great man,
and some people want to shit on his grave,(thats really adult of you)
Just let him be.

move on...

Torboturk, there are some Greek Cypriots (e.g Grivas) that died several decades ago who had committed only a small fraction of the crimes that Ecevit did, and not only TC say very bad things about them (rightly so) but they use those events as an excuse for continuing their crimes and illegalities against the whole Greek Cypriot population.

It is obvious that you want to "move on" when it is about forgetting the crimes of Turkey against us which still affect us, but when the situation is reversed you want to always remember the crimes of Grivas and some others and use them as an excuse for continuing the illegalities in Cyprus.

Take the Turkish troops our of Cyprus, stop the illegalities, and then we will move on. What do you think?

[EUropean666]

I guess that turks will have to discover a new god and put it next to Kemal's idols. The only country with two official cults...islamic and kemalist....

[Kifeas]

This is what scumbag Ecevit has said in a very recent interview, in relation to Cyprus.

TNA: How do you see the future of Cyprus issue?

ECEVIT: We shouldn't ever have a Cyprus problem, because the island has never been administered by Greeks in the history. So I don't see any problem today.

TNA: Do you mean the de facto situation is the solution for Cyprus?

ECEVIT: Yes and I believe it will never change.

From: http://www.thenewanatolian.com/tna-7211.html

[Attorney]

This is what scumbag Ecevit has said in a very recent interview, in relation to Cyprus.

TNA: How do you see the future of Cyprus issue?

ECEVIT: We shouldn't ever have a Cyprus problem, because the island has never been administered by Greeks in the history. So I don't see any problem today.

TNA: Do you mean the de facto situation is the solution for Cyprus?

ECEVIT: Yes and I believe it will never change.

From: http://www.thenewanatolian.com/tna-7211.html

And exactly what part of this do you not agree with?

Do you think it would be a better solution to have the two communities (whose members want "to shit" in the grave of the other one's leader) live together ?

Funny

[Kifeas]

This is what scumbag Ecevit has said in a very recent interview, in relation to Cyprus.

TNA: How do you see the future of Cyprus issue?

ECEVIT: We shouldn't ever have a Cyprus problem, because the island has never been administered by Greeks in the history. So I don't see any problem today.

TNA: Do you mean the de facto situation is the solution for Cyprus?

ECEVIT: Yes and I believe it will never change.

From: http://www.thenewanatolian.com/tna-7211.html

And exactly what part of this do you not agree with?

Do you think it would be a better solution to have the two communities (whose members want "to shit" in the grave of the other one's leader) live together ?

Funny

For the record, Ecevit was not a TC leader.

Anyway, from the above I understand that you prefer the situation to remain as it is, likewise Ecevit does. I must remind you though that this policy is not the one the current leadership of your community under Talat claims to pursue, neither it seems to be the what the majority of the TC community pursues, judging from their approval to the Annan plan, and if we assume that the A-plan was indeed what they (TCs) claim it has been, i.e. a re-unification plan.

Therefore, your above argument is disproved and disqualified, not by me as a GC, but by the members and current leadership of your community; and your above implied suggestion should first be addressed to them, since you seem to accept and approve what Ecevit used to say.