Not
so long ago, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, prime minister of Turkey from 2003
until 2014 and president since, was hailed as a model leader of an
emerging economy with an admirably moderate Islamist bent.
Read more: Turkey’s Erdogan Should Listen to the Voters - The New York Times
At the helm
of the Justice and Development Party (A.K.P.) he had created, Mr.
Erdogan oversaw an economic recovery and introduced democratic reforms
(part of an effort to win admission to the European Union), achieved a
truce with Kurdish nationalists and curbed the power of an ambitious
military.
Yet today, on the eve of a second national election
within five months, which Mr. Erdogan engineered after being battered
in the first, many of those achievements have been undermined, in no
small part because of Mr. Erdogan’s relentless drive to win and
consolidate power.
The
Turkish military is again bombing Kurdish separatists; opposition
parties have trouble holding rallies or getting airtime; rivals are
branded as terrorists; opposition media is intimidated or muzzled. The
economy, which grew an impressive 9.2 percent in 2010, is now expected
to grow by 3 percent this year, according to the International Monetary
Fund.
Read more: Turkey’s Erdogan Should Listen to the Voters - The New York Times