President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ruling party is wrought with “widespread unhappiness”, his former prime minister has warned as he raised the prospect of leading a breakaway faction that could split Turkey’s dominant political movement. Ahmet Davutoglu said that a deviation by the Justice and Development party (AKP) from its core values was fomenting deep discontent among the party’s grassroots and its upper echelons, Financial Times writes.
The AKP once prized “justice, freedom, freedom of thought, freedom of expression”, Mr Davutoglu said in an interview with the Financial Times. “[But] over the past three years, what I have observed is that these basic values we respected throughout our life were ignored,” added the former party chairman, who resigned in 2016 following a power struggle with Mr Erdogan.
He said Turkey’s “institutions are weakening” and that the shift to a presidential system that placed unprecedented power in the hands of Mr Erdogan was “damaging the basic structures” of Turkey.
"What we need is a new psychology based on openness, transparency, freedom and speaking without fear," Davutoglu said.
Ahmet Davutoglu, former Turkish prime minister Mr Davutoglu, an important AKP figure since the party swept to power in 2002, is one of two heavyweights to have publicly voiced discontent after a painful election setback that resulted in the party losing control of Istanbul, Turkey’s largest city, and Ankara, the capital.
The former prime minister broke his silence in April with a 4,000-word critique of the direction the AKP was taking. Earlier this month, Ali Babacan, an influential former economy minister, said he was resigning from the party because Turkey needed a “new future vision”.
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