Wan Azizah slammed over support of Erdogan
(The Star) – Datuk Seri Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail (pic) has come under fire over a congratulatory message to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan for winning a referendum, which grants him more executive powers.
Human rights lawyers, activists and supporters alike criticised the opposition leader, adding that she should know better than to support Erdogan, whom they described as a “dictator”.
Dr Wan Azizah had on Tuesday congratulated the citizens of Turkey for the “peaceful exercise of their democratic rights” in Sunday’s constitutional referendum.
It is public knowledge that Dr Wan Azizah’s husband Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim and her family have close ties with Erdogan.
“Turkey continues to be a role model for the developing world with its consistent exercise of democracy, economic growth and the betterment of the living conditions of its people,” she said in a statement.
Human rights lawyer Eric Paulsen in a tweet said it was “quite unnecessary” for such a statement to have been made.
“Turkey under Endogan [sic] can hardly be described as ‘democratic’.
“How many journalists, cartoonists, academics, writers, judges, politicians are under politically motivated detention in Turkey right now?” he said.
Creative writing trainer and author Sharon Bakar described Dr Wan Azizah’s statement as “absolutely idiotic”.
“I held you in higher regard than this because I thought you had respect for the democratic process,” she wrote under the PKR leader’s Facebook post which published the statement.
A Facebook commenter Darul Kisai asked if the statement meant that Malaysians were supposed to be in favour of Turkey’s strong-arm government tactics that centralises power in the executive and reduces checks and balances.
“Simply because we don’t want to be seen as being in the same camp as western critics of Turkey, because we don’t like these same westerners for being unhelpful to prevent the excessive centralisation of power in Malaysia?
“That is a bizarre, short-sighted, and self-defeating position for the Malaysian opposition to take. Shame on you (or the surrogate who wrote this for you),” he said.
A constitutional referendum, which was held throughout Turkey on April 16, saw 18 proposed amendments brought forward by the governing Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) approved.
This also means that the Prime Minister’s office will be abolished and the existing parliamentary system replaced with an executive presidency and a presidential system.
The number of parliamentary seats were also raised from 550 to 600 while the president is to be given more control over appointments to the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors.
The referendum was called following a failed military coup in July last year, which saw mass arrests of journalists, university deans, soldiers, and government staff some of whom have yet to face trial.
