Stalled for two years, Türkiye's Green Party can’t cut through Ankara’s red tape

The Green Party has faced a two-year bureaucratic blockade stalling its formal establishment. (Photo: Green Party)

"We believe in transitioning to green energies and creating jobs while reducing our negative impact on the environment. We need to build justice within and among nations. We need to make people happy."

This is how Koray Doğan Urbarlı, co-speaker of Türkiye's Green Party, described the party's plans.

"For 20 years, people couldn't enjoy their youth," he continued. "What they want is to live like their peers in Italy, Japan or Korea. And we need to find a way to offer this. They deserve it."

Urbarlı's words likely resonate with some of the nation's six million young adults who in next year's elections will be eligible to vote for the first time. Like their peers elsewhere, the next generation in Türkiye is troubled by their prospects in a world defined by the rising cost of living as well as the worsening effects of climate change.

Yet before Türkiye's Green Party can take part in elections, it must first overcome bureaucratic stonewalling from Ankara. For more than two years, the Interior Ministry has blocked the party's formal establishment despite, as party members claim, meeting the eligibility criteria.

Under normal circumstances, the founders of a political party deliver their documents to the Interior Ministry, whose task is to ensure the necessary papers are submitted. Once this is confirmed, the party is issued a 'certificate of receipt' and is officially launched.

"It is one of the easiest things to do in Türkiye," Urbarlı told Turkey recap.

The comment was confirmed by Bertil Emrah Oder, professor of constitutional law at Koç University.

"In Türkiye, political parties are not subject to prior permission. There is a notification process, not a permission process," Oder explained. "Despite all of Türkiye's problems with regards to freedom of association, the documentation required to form a political party has been kept to a minimum."

This is not to imply that political parties operate freely. The state does keep a firm grip on them, but usually after they are launched, Oder said. This is why the Green Party's predicament appears grossly unusual.

In August 2020, the Greens submitted their documents to the Interior Ministry. A week later, they were asked to correct some criminal record certificates. Three days after that, another problem arose concerning the political party memberships of several party founders. When both issues were resolved, the ministry made an additional request, to which the party responded on the same day. That was October 19, 2020.

The following Monday, approximately a month after their initial application, the Greens received their last communication from the ministry. They were informed that the relevant department would be off duty due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

"We didn't really understand what we were up against," Urbarlı confessed, noting that at first, they really thought the pandemic was causing the delays. But while their launch was kept on hold, other political parties mushroomed. Between their October 2020 application and March 23, 2021, when they decided to bring the matter to court, 11 new political parties were given certificates of receipt.

As of today, a total of about 32 political parties have been formed since October 2020, including Ümit Özdağ's Victory Party (ZP) and Muharrem İnce's Homeland Party (MP). Apart from the Green Party, just one other group, the Humanity and Freedom Party (İÖP), faced a similar obstruction.

With the 2023 elections on the horizon, the launch process has been a race against time and the added legal procedures have proven unhelpful.

At first, the court decided for rejection of venue – a decision later overturned by a court of appeals. Some 18 months after the trial began, the court unanimously decided in favor of the Green Party and adopted a motion for stay of execution, basically asking the ministry to deliver the certificate of receipt.

But the Interior Ministry objected to the decision once more. Currently, it remains unclear whether the Green Party might launch and on what timeline.

Green Party members are convinced they are facing "political obstruction", especially due to the lack of explanation regarding what might be wrong with their documents. The Interior Ministry did not respond to Turkey recap's requests for comment.

"At question here is both the violation of a constitutionally protected right, and a nonprocedural action on part of the Ministry of Interior," Oder explained, stressing that the ministry's silence and inaction are both undesirable under principles of good governance.

"What we don't know is the reason behind this hurdle," Urbarlı said, speculating it could be about the potential role the Greens could play within alliance politics.

The 2018 shift to a presidential system compelled political parties to form alliances to gather over 50 percent of votes. As a result of this system, even small parties can tip the balance in favor of one alliance or another, and therefore, have a newfound significance.

In case of the Greens, their potential appeal to Türkiye's substantial Gen Z population, which could cast some 16 percent of votes in the 2023 elections, is an added strength.

"The findings of public surveys across the world reveal that people, especially Gen Z and Y, are concerned about the same risks," said Fuat Keyman, political scientist at Sabancı University and director of the Istanbul Policy Center, adding young people are increasingly worried about inequalities, global warming, and matters relating to their personal lifestyle choices and freedoms – what Keyman describes as "dignity."

Youth voters preferences in Türkiye mirror global trends, Keyman told Turkey recap, underlining that it is hard to tell what the youth's heightened concerns over inequality and climate change might imply for their political preferences.

"I wouldn't say the government is intimidated by the Greens, but there is a strong undercurrent that is hard to control or direct, and they can't predict how this will play out amongst undecided voters, young voters, concerned conservatives or Kurds," Keyman said. "There may be an undercurrent attracted to green politics, and it may gravitate towards the Greens, these are hard to assess."

Indeed, few could have guessed in 2013 that the sit-in protests by a small group of environmental activists against the demolition of Gezi Park could morph into one of the largest anti-government protests in the country's history.

As opposed to a fear of competition at the ballot box, the idea that the government might be looking to suppress a potential movement seems more "reasonable" to Özer Sencar, director of the polling company, MetroPoll.

"It doesn't make sense for the AKP to consider the Green Party a rival," Sencar said, noting that even if some youths were to support the Greens, those votes would come from the opposition bloc, and not the AKP's own constituents.

"It's not possible to say the youth is waiting for the Green Party with bated breath either, at least I can't say that," Sencar told Turkey recap.

If launched, the new Greens would be the third Green Party in Türkiye's history after two short-lived attempts in 1988 and 2008. While the first GP was closed in 1994 by the Constitutional Court due to a problem with its financial obligations, the latter merged with the Equality and Democracy Party in 2012, only to part ways some four years later. Neither party caused enough stir to justify fears about a third attempt.

But blocking the Greens as a way of "bringing these young people under control, restraining their actions" is sensible, Sencar postulated. "They might be thinking that organizing under the corporate identity of a political party could make the youth more active."

Urbarlı agrees it would be "highly unrealistic" to expect the Greens to cause a voter surge at the ballot box, but he believes they can offer something almost as important to the opposition alliance: credibility.

"If we were to join an alliance, that alliance would be deemed more credible on certain subjects," he said, giving the examples of climate change and European integration. This, Urbarlı believes, could potentially result in a "multiplier effect" that could prove significant within the delicate calculations of alliance politics.

While the Green Party may contribute to the electoral success of Türkiye's opposition alliance – dubbed the Table of Six – Keyman argues the group should be invited into the bloc not merely to boost its chances of victory, but to create space for a necessary voice in Turkish politics.

"The Green Party has a dual purpose: On the one hand, to put the urgency of the climate crisis on Türkiye's political agenda. And second, to expand the understanding of green transition to include the needs of vulnerable groups, to encompass a just transition," Keyman explained, underlining that the presence of the Greens in the parliament is "morally and ethically important for Türkiye's future."

Türkiye's geographic, climatic and socioeconomic conditions make it particularly vulnerable to climate change, the effects of which have been increasingly felt, be it through wildfires across the Mediterranean, flash floods in the Black Sea region, or sea snot in the Sea of Marmara. Still, there has yet to be a political party to champion the public's rising concerns on this front.

"The entire world is going through a very important period, and there are big, deep debates around climate change, rights of nature, and the environment. We can predict that the Greens will bring these matters to center of public debate, which is what makes them very important in terms of ideological pluralism," Oder said.

"So, in this sense as well, the Green Party will represent an important political agenda," she said. "If it can be launched." (SU/VK)

This report was produced by Turkey recap with support from the Heinrich Böll Foundation in Türkiye and the IPS Communication Foundation.

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