New economic model will place Turkey among top 10 economies: Erdoğan

ISTANBUL

The new economic model that the government has recently started implementing will help Turkey become one of the world’s top 10 economies, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has said, reiterating that high interest rates are the cause of high inflation.

“With our new economy program, we are rapidly moving towards our goal of placing Turkey among the top 10 economies,” Erdoğan said in an address to the members of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) at a meeting in Istanbul on Dec. 26.

The new model prioritizes investments, production, exporting and employment as the main pillars for growing the Turkish economy by lowering interest rates. “Interest rates make the rich richer, the poor poorer. We will break this cycle and let our people achieve the main goal,” he said, repeating his view that inflation is the result of high interest rates.

Turkey has been resilient against all global economic crises thanks to the infrastructure the AKP governments provided in the past 19 years, Erdoğan said, adding: “We should explain that our ultimate goal of becoming one of top 10 economies in the world is a close reality and no longer a dream.”

Erdoğan recalled that the AKP has targets for 2023, the centennial of the Republic of Turkey, and a vision for 2053, the 600th anniversary of the conquest of Istanbul, blaming some foreign powers and their collaborators for trying to quell them.

“We should tell [our citizens] that the plots for destroying our economy are aiming to distract us from our targets. We should also tell them that the recent games on interest rates and foreign currency [appreciation against the national currency] are part of this plot but we have enough power and determination to defeat them,” he suggested.

If Turkey has been able to come so far it is thanks to the AKP governments’ rule since the early 2000s, the president said, stressing that all these targets set for 2023 and 2053 can be implemented by the party.

Some foreign powers are unhappy because of the construction of a great and powerful Turkey, Erdoğan said, and blamed the main opposition party for pursuing a policy of lies against the AKP government. “We should persuade our people that Turkey will face the biggest disasters if the rule of this country passes to them [the opposition alliance] as we have seen in Istanbul following municipal elections [in 2019],” he said.

Calling on all the AKP branches to gear up efforts for the upcoming elections in 2023, Erdoğan stated that the opposition is also working toward the polls in a much more ambitious way and with support.