Erdogan settles his accounts before lifting state of emergency

NEWS DESK

Turkish authorities announced on Sunday the isolation of more than 18,000 public employees, mostly policemen and from the army, and the closure of 12 institutions, three newspapers and a television channel. The measure comes hours before a possible lifting of the state of emergency imposed on the country since the failed coup d’état attempt in mid-July 2016.

The official newspaper of Turkey published on Sunday a decree dismissing more than 18,000 public employees, including many members of the security forces and the army, as well as employees in the Justice and Education Ministries.

The Turkish media have reported that the state of emergency will be lifted on Monday after the President Recep Tayyip Erdogan swore the oath, and the lifting of the state of emergency was one of the promises of his electoral campaign.

The Opposition and the Organizations of Defending Human Rights criticize these purging campaigns, and they consider them as an attempt to silence all criticisms.

On Monday, a presidential system will enter into force by a constitutional amendment adopted after a referendum held in April 2017. The prime minister’s post will be cancelled, and the president will hold the full executive power. Erdogan's hegemony will be extended to the Turkish state and he will be able to issue presidential decrees.

A number of the Turkish politicians got worried that Erdogan would take decisions that will enter the Turkish state into a dangerous dilemma, the most important of which is dealing the secularism of the state a fatal blow to and dedicating his project represented by the Islamization of Turkey.

A.H

ANHA