Turkish Parliament Speaker Debates Secularism

[AlphaMonster 1,806]

Last week, Turkish Parliamentary speaker Ismail Kahraman caused great outrage in Turkish society with his remarks about secularism:   
"Only 3 countries in the world defines their state as secular in their constitution, those are Turkey, France and Ireland. New constitution should be about people. There is no god in Turkey's constitution but religious holidays are state holidays...." 
and added: "Removing secularism from new constitution can be discussed. Turkey should have a religious constitution."

2nd article of Turkish Constitution defines Republic of Turkey as a secular state. 4th Article says: "The provision of Article 1 regarding the form of the State being a Republic, the characteristics of the Republic in Article 2, and the provisions of Article 3 shall not be amended, nor shall their amendment be proposed."

3 opposition parties that have seats in Parliament invited Kahraman to resign. Public outrage did not seem to end anytime soon, since last week, no public event is seemed to pass by without showing outrage to Kahraman's words from public demonstrations to sport events. Also Ömer Çelik, spokesperson of Turkey's majority party(AKP), said that "Kahraman's words represents his own views, not AKP's views. Secularism, democracy and rule of law are undebatable values for our party. Secularism is not open to discussion, and has always been included in proposals of New Constitution.", also opposing to Kahraman's words, Çelik said that "A constitution cannot be religious. Laws have to stand at equidistance from every faith group."

President Erdogan also publicly criticized Kahraman's words, "My view of secularism is specified in program of political party I founded (AKP). Our state has to treat all faith groups equally, and protect liberty of its citizens regardless of their religion. Secularism is included in party declaration's of AKP, and declarations of my presidential campaign. I think this discussion of secularism is nothing but a try to change agenda of our country during these days we have to fight against terrorism."

Kahraman went too far behind to the point where AKP's conservatism could not reach. Last person to get this much negative reception from AKP itself was Minister Aliye Kavaf who said that "I believe homosexuality is a disease that can be treated.", she first got publicly criticized by nationwide authority of the field (Türkiye Psikiyatri Derneği), then AKP's leaders followed the same trend, Kavaf ended up loosing her seat as Minister and as MP. I personally expect Kahraman to slowly be forced to disappear from politics. 

Prime Minister Davutoglu said that "Turkey's position on its being a secular, democratic, social state is not up to debate." in an angry tone at the beginning of this press conference, which shows that Kahraman will not be in parliament after next elections for sure. 

[SychosSoChic 9,995]

Glad people aren't having it. In this day and age you have to separate state and religion.