Prodigiously Arrogant

"There are media institutions, organizations and gangs in Turkey who think of others' interests rather than their own country's interests, and are working as spies in a treasonous manner."
"They speak of the Qu'ran and of Allah but are remembered for ... plots".
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan

Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan addresses his party members in Ankara, Turkey, on Wednesday. Three Cabinet ministers resigned on December 25, amidst a sweeping corruption and bribery scandal that has targeted Mr. Erdogan's allies in one of the worst political crises of his more than 10 years in power.   AP

Well, now, isn't that priceless? President Erdogan, standing at a podium addressing his party, the Justice and Development Party, standing before giant portraits of himself and Turkey's historical figure of liberation from political-ideological Islam, Kemal Ataturk, side by side, of equal glorious display. The very man and the very political party which overturned all that Ataturk achieved for his country using his image and his honoured position as a hero to reflect his own brilliant status.

Turkey is well known for its repression and attacks against independent news agencies and journalists. Reporters Without Borders doesn't think highly of the Justice and Development Party and their leader. Nor, one might venture, does the Turkish military, now stripped of its elite generals who once vowed to uphold Kemal Ataturk's secular-governed Turkey, the crossroads between Europe and the Middle East.

Now they are joined by the Turkish police, some 550 of whom have been arrested for doing their job, being alert to rampant graft and corruption and taking steps to apprehend those engaged in both. Unfortunately, those individuals were very close to the prime minister, members of his Islamist Justice and Development Party, and members of his cabinet. As for the country's central state run bank, Halkbank, its chief executive was discovered to be stashing millions not under his mattress but in shoe boxes.

A day ago, three government ministers abruptly resigned; their sons accused of corruption and arrested in an ongoing investigation. Heads rolled; police chiefs suddenly found themselves out of favour to the extent they were out of a job. But the three government ministers; Economy Minister Zafer Caglayan, Interior Minister Muammer Guler and Environment and Urban Planning Minister Erdogan Bayraktar resigned, quite nobly removing their presumed guilt from besmirching the government.

However, Mr. Bayraktar did not go quietly into that dark night. On television, broadcast to a wide and fascinated audience he claimed to have been forced to hand in his resignation. Mr. Erdogan, he said, was, as it happened, also involved in corrupt real estate deals. The incorruptible somehow corrupt. How horribly distressing. As though Mr. Erdogan needs this kind of miserable publicity. His popularity has suffered a hit of late.

"The prime minister has the right to work with the ministers he prefers, but I can't accept this pressure on me to resign. The prime minister too has to resign", said Mr. Bayraktar. How amazing that the man doesn't appear to really know his prime minister. Mr. Erdogan resign? Not bloody likely. He has expressed himself in a raging paranoia that his enemies are out to get him and he intends to get them first.

Ironic that one of his enemies is a man who was once accused of attempting to chart Turkey on an Islamist course, then cleared of the charge. That he is an Islamist is beyond denial. It was the then-secular government that accused him and he fled Turkey for haven in the United States. But it is not just Fethullah Gulen the Muslim cleric who has a large following in Turkey whom Mr. Erdogan accuses of plotting to unseat him and his government.

Two Islamists slamming it out between themselves; too fastidious to name names, but quite fixated on defaming one another. Prime Minister Erdogan fairly spits fury when he speaks of the treasonous machinations of Fethullah Gulen with his presumed insiders within the police and judiciary, all plotting to unseat the legally elected and democratic government. Whose reputation is impeccable beyond criticism.

He speaks obliquely but he has the United States and the U.S. Ambassador Francis Ricciardone in his sight lines as well. When Mr. Erdogan is offended by an individual, a movement, a protest group, a country that he believes has been somewhat less than respectful to him, he becomes unforgivingly and implacably set against them; they are his enemies for life.

His own supercilious arrogance carries him through the day. It remains to be seen whether the growing disaffection with his government and himself at the helm may lead to a pallid response to his intention to face an enthusiastic electorate that has continued to return him back to power on two previous occasions. The economy has taken a hit, public trust in Turkey and on the international scene has as well, and his popularity is plunging.

Tch, tch.