CHP proposes laws to clean remains of coup

ANKARA - Hürriyet Daily News

Main opposition leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu announces his party’s ‘Democratic Package for Coup Cleaning.’ AA photo

Main opposition leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu yesterday urged all political parties to lend their support to a comprehensive set of reforms his Republican People’s Party (CHP) has compiled, called the “Democratic Package for Coup Cleaning.”

The Constitution and laws enacted in the wake of the 1980 military coup are still in force, although more than 30 years have passed since then, Kılıçdaroğlu said, speaking at a press conference. “If the laws made by those that led the putsch are still in force, it means they are still governing the country,” Kılıçdaroğlu said, charging that the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) is taking advantage of those laws.

The package Kılıçdaroğlu proposed contains amendments that the CHP has already been submitting to Parliament since December 2001 as part of an “urgent democracy package.” It has so far submitted drafts that call for lowering the election threshold, the abolition of special-authority courts, limiting lengthy pre-trial detentions and the removal of provisions in the anti-terrorism law that restrict press freedom.

“The AKP has monopolized the status quo for 10 years. They change everything that disturbs them, but they have no problem with laws made by the coup leaders. If someone has no problem with the coup laws, then they have a problem with democracy,” Kılıçdaroğlu said.

Kılıçdaroğlu described his party’s proposals as “sine qua non for democracy,” calling for a united effort to “clean up the totalitarian mess and institutions created by the coup.”

Separately, CHP deputy Umut Oran said he had prepared a pamphlet about the inconsistencies in the Sledgehammer coup case and distributed it last week to members of the European Parliament. He said he wrote the pamphlet because European politicians were asking more and more questions about Turkey’s coup cases. Oran rejected accusations that he was telling “fairytales” to the Europeans.