If America is land of the free, what is Turkey? Land of the déjà vu''s?

Last week, an interview Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan gave to German weekly Welt Am Sonntag made that odd feeling of déjà vu reappear for all of us.

Suppose you were here in Turkey, in the 1980''s, as a fresh young diplomat from a friendly country, following events closely, what would have occupied you most to report back then? There is one topic which distinguishes itself among many others: the headscarf issue. We discussed the headscarf issue thoroughly during the ''80''s. If you were reassigned to Ankara in the ''90''s as an experienced counselor in your embassy, your hands most certainly were full with the news reports you filed back to your homeland about the headscarf ban at Turkish universities. Now you must have become an ambassador, your subordinates at the embassy are trying to familiarize themselves with the same issue already warn-out for you.

So it is déjà vu all over.

The most offending crime any outsider commits to an ''enlightened Turk'' is to compare him with an Oriental. You cannot find but very few who would not feel uncomfortable when you question his right to call himself European. Curiously enough, the same ''enlightened Turk'' would not mind being confronted with a question whether he was able to indicate any country in Europe restricting university education for ladies on the bases of their attire.

Of course I know that France recently adopted a law to prohibit students wearing headscarves, but in elementary and secondary schools. Some German regions have started to apply dress codes to state employees. No country in Europe has attempted to tackle the same rule for university education.

Turkey is an eyesore in for whole of Europe by erecting barriers to some graduates of secondary schools eager to further their studies. Many young ladies who cover their heads with headscarves have been successful at university exams, theoretically enabling them to study any field they wish, but they cannot do so. They are turned away from the gates of the campuses when they appear there with their headscarves on.

In the past this has caused a great many problems, but with the ascendancy of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) to power the issue has become even more compelling. The wives of some AKP leaders, including Prime Minister Erdogan''s wife, are ladies with headscarves. Mr. Erdogan''s two daughters had to go abroad to study when they finished their pre-university education. A core in the AKP grassroots has been suffering under the ban and doing everything to call for change in the situation.

There is no solution to the problem so far, we face a complete stalemate.

I do not know how to tell the essence of the story without making you giggle. We, in Turkey, have a law, or rather a clause in the university law stating openly that one is allowed to wear any kind of outfit at universities as long as the outfit is not against the existing laws. I would not suggest you should ask the logical question: So, is legalistically the ban on headscarf unfounded?

Not quite so. Although we do have a law enacted in 1991 permitting headscarves at universities, at the same time we have a 1989 Constitutional Court ruling prohibiting the same. On top of that, a seven-judge panel at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg sided with our Constitutional Court last year, but its decision was accepted as referral by the grand chamber soon after.

The Welt am Sonntag interview created quite an uproar in the media and attracted various commentaries on what Mr. Erdogan said about the necessity to open the gates of universities for ladies with headscarves too. Almost all commentaries have been unfavorable. Reading them can give the unfamiliar reader a wrong sense, a sense that the Turkish public resent even discussion of the issue. The reality itself cannot be farther from that assumption.

In all opinion polls conducted over the years, the public''s attitude towards the headscarf is very favorable. TESEV, a social democrat think tank, assigned a poll in late 1999 to two respected professors of political science from Bogazici University, one of the most prestigious academic institutions. The result defied the ban: 76 % replied "Yes" to a question asking "Should universities allow students to cover their heads, if the students so desire?" Those not against the headscarf ban numbered only 16 %. Another survey commissioned by Milliyet to Tarhan Erdem, who is also a social democrat, showed that 77 % of households have one or more women with headscarves.

Times change and so do laws according to changing times. The Supreme Court in the US has reversed its decision on flag-burning issue and some other issues related to secular facets of the system are under discussion there. In Turkey we love to discuss issues, but hate to solve them if they are thorny.

So, if you opt to retire and live in Turkey after a successful career as a diplomat, let us say in another 10 years, it is not too far-fetched to assume that you will find us discussing the headscarf issue as heatedly as we have been doing for the last 25.

From ''The New Anatolian'', February 15, 2005.