You read about Aydın Doğan's whiny statement, which at the same time assumes the reader is gullible, and which disregards societal memory, portraying a patriotic image, purified of all past sins and which emphasized the rhetoric of the oppressed published through the Hürriyet daily, while still secretly implying the idea that “I am still the main power.”
The Hürriyet daily is accustomed to such pieces, and shutting the President or the Prime Minister up. Previously, they had wanted to shut former President Turgut Özal up. This time, although the language used in the piece seems like they are saying “we've bowed down, have some mercy on us,” at the same time it is the continuation of the allegation which says “we are the power which forms and brings down governments. We are the respondents of the state administration, we are the power elites.”
It is true that Aydın Doğan and figures like him are part of the state apparatus in the history of the Republic. These “oligarchs” are the representatives of the state's fragmented power. The rulership of the people and the fate of the country have been divided amongst these. A system has been established through these power elites. The political history of the republic is a comedy where democracy was shaped by the military, civilian bureaucracy and selected intellectuals and capital circles.
In this type of democracy, the only “privilege” bestowed upon the masses is to go to the ballot box and cast their votes. Whatever is beyond this is controlled by the selected oligarchic structure. Both the political administration, economic power and social projects, as well as the cultural identity, identification of the country's interests and friendship or enmity relations all belong to them.
During these decades, which have been shaped and governed by them, democracy in Turkey meant only the ballot box. The rest consisted of a state of caution for not bringing the nation close to the state power, authoritarianism, exploitation of the country's resources and the consideration of the electorate as a threat.
Aydın Doğan is the feudal lord of such a country. He is only one of the feudal lords. Because the country had been divided amongst different feudal lords. These lords are hostile to anything that relates to nationalism, religion, history, fraternity and partnership and the region.
The power assigned to them has been given for these hostilities. This disdain, arrogance, and the abasement of the people are indicators and result of this bargain. For them, Islam is an enemy, the Kurd is an enemy, the Arab is an enemy and they are evil. Turkey's interests do not transcend the interests of Germany, England or the U.S.
These lords had never taken their power from these lands. They took it from the tutelage administrations established in Turkey. They acted as custodians on behalf of them. This was the reason why they got in a conflict with Turkey and the people of this country and during every such conflict they sided with the powers and countries which designated tutelage. They were never local. They looked local and nationalist, but were outsiders, and they concealed their own interests with the interests of the exterior forces which instituted tutelage.
Aydın Doğan is not a person, he is a mindset.
This is the reason why Turkey has been through an Aydın Doğan syndrome for the past three decades. This is a feudal order, an oligarch cruelty. They had used the power allocated for them against the nation, without any hesitation.
In each opportunity that the people whom they had despised and looked down on tried to raise their voice and get closer to the state and act as one, they became coup initiators, economic crisis initiators and have turned the crises into opportunity to enrich their wealth. As if it was not enough for them to label those who had gathered in Istanbul's Beyazıt Square in the 1990s to protest the headscarf ban as terrorists, they also wrote headlines titled “the black Friday.” Titles such as “411 hands raised in favor of chaos” contrary to the choice of the people are precisely because of this. In the societal memory of this country, what has been done by the Doğan Group and some power elites like it is very explicit, distinct and those traces do not seem like they will be erased.
Aydın Doğan is one of the architects of the February 28 post-modern coup. But that coup was actually planned by the neo-cons in the U.S. and the extreme right in Israel, and was implemented through their aides in Turkey. It was served from the exterior and was marketed through the Doğan media organs. They were bringing down governments, establishing new ones and shaping cabinets, and apportioning tenders. They were the absolute rulers over the wealth and domestic policy of this country and the rest was just meager details.
Let me remind you of an article from November 2, 2001: “Mesut Yılmaz, the chairman of the Homeland Party (ANAP) and the deputy Prime Minister, who shared a common fate with Aydın Doğan, the President of the Doğan Conglomerate, held a meeting with the executives of Albayrak A.Ş. who are the owners of our newspaper. Doğan, who stated that he toppled the 54th government himself was quoted as saying, 'During the Refah-Yol Government, the Finance, Treasury and Foreign Export Undersecretaries started to pressure me. They put my accounts under inspection. I had two months left. I said it was either me or the 54th government. I pushed the button and toppled. I would have been toppled if I did not topple the government.'”
Now let us ask: are the finance and tax inspectors putting pressure on you again? Are you making the same warning through these editorials? Does this mean “The government should be toppled if I will be toppled?” Countless coup attempts have taken place since 2003. Scenarios were written and implemented to bring down the AK Party government, the same way they were done for the Refah-Yol government. None of them succeeded. All of them had the same goal: to get rid of the government whatever the cost, whether it is through a coup or something else. This was the reason behind the support for the Gezi Protests and the December 17 coup attempt. The preference of a strong majority of the people meant the ballot box for you again. Democracy was only a matter of the ballot box. Since you were the rulers after that.
Again? Why does a decades-long “habit” not change, and why do some things in Turkey change from the root, but the mindset of Aydın Doğan always come up with the same methods? You are trying to shut Turkey up through the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) which you used to call terrorists yesterday. You attempt a restoration of the system, and revision of the regime through HDP. In this regard, did you think the lining up of old Turkey's oligarchs and their attempt to pull the AK Party backwards through their investments, the attempt to make President Erdoğan eat humble pie, and the attempts to sabotage Turkey's transformation would not be understood by this nation?
The longest lasting ruling party in Turkey has been Aydın Doğan and the oligarchs behind him. Sentences which start by “Dear Mr. President” actually mean “watch your step.” They entered a very explicit and destructive war.
But the “feudal period” is over now. This is the greatest revolution experienced by Turkey till now.
