Davutoğlu says he tried to make Erdoğan talk to youth during Gezi protests

Duvar English

Turkey's former Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu, the leader of the newly established Future Party, has said that he had given effort to put President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in touch with the protesters of the 2013 Gezi Park movement at the time, but could not “convince” him.

“It is being said that during my time as a [foreign affairs] minister and prime minister, I have stayed silent while Turkey was going through difficult periods. This is not true. I have said of my opinions, objected and tried to change things in every process from Gezi to Dec. 17 [corruption scandal in 2013],” Davutoğlu said during an interview with Murat Sabuncu from the online newspaper of T24.

Following months of speculation, Davutoğlu, a founding member of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), established his new party in December to challenge Erdoğan's hold on center-right voters. Davutoğlu may draw votes away from the traditional AKP electorate, but he faces the criticism that he turned a blind eye to the democratic backsliding that happened in Turkey partly under his watch. During his interview with T24, Davutoğlu gave examples of incidents in which he had objected to the AKP's policies but was met with criticism by Erdoğan.

“During Gezi [movement], I tried to take Mr. Tayyip [Erdoğan] to Taksim, among the youth, and get him in touch with them, but I could not convince him. I talked with names from the Taksim Solidarity and arranged a meeting,” he said.

The protests that erupted in Istanbul's Taksim Square in May 2013 saw a local environmental protest bloom into a nationwide pro-democracy movement. The movement was primarily a youth movement as the average of participants ranged between 20-30 years. Erdoğan, who was at the time the prime minister, dismissed the protesters as "a few looters," ordering the police to suppress the protests with tear gas and water cannons.

In addition to the 11 deaths and over 8,000 injuries, more than 3,000 arrests were made during the weeks-long-protests. Davutoğlu was at the time the foreign affairs minister. In 2014, he became AKP chair and prime minister, once Erdoğan stepped down to become the country's president.

Dec 17-25, 2013 graft probe an 'important breaking point'

Davutoğlu during his interview also touched upon the Dec. 17-25, 2013 corruption scandal, which refers to a criminal investigation that involves high-level politicians.

Davutoğlu said that although the scandal was “explicitly” an attempt of the Gülen network to bring down the government, he at the time wanted to see the ministers' cases being sent to the Supreme Council court (known as “Yüce Divan” in Turkish) for the ministers to be “in the clear.”

Four ministers resigned in December 2013 in light of the corruption allegations but denied any wrongdoing. Erdoğan responded with a major cabinet reshuffle, saying that the allegations against his former ministers stemmed from a coup plot orchestrated by the Gülen network.

Later, a parliamentary commission was established in an attempt to investigate the graft claims, but parliament – in which the AKP had a clear majority – voted against sending the former ministers to trail in front of the Supreme Council court, which only hears cases against ministers and other top officials.

Davutoğlu said that at the time he had summoned the ministers to his office for a meeting, during which they had all “agreed” on sending their cases “voluntarily” to the court. The ministers however gave up on the idea a day later after speaking with Erdoğan, Davutoğlu said. “I have found out that the ministers had spoken with Mr. Tayyip [Erdoğan] and that he had said 'Do not do it.' I immediately went up to him and asked why he did that. That was one of the important breaking points,” he said.

Davutoğlu also touched upon his falling out with Erdoğan over the issue of the Academics for Peace petition, which was signed by hundreds of academics in January 2016. The petition criticized the government for its violation of human rights and civilian casualties among Turkey’s Kurdish-populated towns, asking that the authorities resume talks with the PKK that the government itself had previously inaugurated.

“The Academics for Peace petition was released. I have had criticism against it, its language, its wording, but in the end it was a freedom of speech. Mr. Tayyip [Erdoğan] invited me and I went. He snapped at me, saying: 'Why are you not taking a tougher stance against this petition; it is like you are defending the terrorists.' And I told him the academics cannot be labelled as terrorists and what he in fact did was against freedom of thought/opinion,” Davutoğlu said.