Turkey continues work to achieve goal of 1st contact with moon aa.com.tr - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from aa.com.tr Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
ANKARA: Prime Minister Suleyman Demirel’s Government resigned here today [March 12], following an ultimatum from the Turkish Armed Forces. The resignation came a little more than four hours after the country’s military chiefs threatened to take over the Government if a new Cabinet, able to meet the country’s demands, was not formed. The Armed Forces were placed on a state of alert when the military leaders’ ultimatum was broadcast. . The military chiefs . threatened to take over the country unless a new Government was formed immediately and measures taken to improve political and economic situation.
A Government Spokesman said Mr. Demirel was going to the Presidency to hand in his Government’s resignation. A new Government will be formed within the country’s formal democratic processes, the spokesman said. It would normally mean that President Cevdet Sunay would call on a political leader to form a Government following Presidential consultations with . political leaders.
No leader stays in power or lives forever, and Turkey’s dictator is getting old.
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has dominated Turkish politics for much of the last two decades. He is the most consequential leader in Turkey since Mustafa Kemal Atatürk who founded modern Turkey almost a century ago. While Atatürk sought to tie Turkey to the West, Erdoğan has worked to reorient Turkey instead to the Islamic world. He built a palace, fifty-eight-times the size of the White House, where he lives like a Sultan. Indeed, that may his goal as he increasingly promotes his own family over party. Erdoğan demands respect. He surrounds himself with courtiers who praise him constantly and imprisons those whose criticize him. While Erdoğan sees himself as larger than life, the true measure of how Turks view him will become apparently only after his death.