Tutelage and the judiciary

In the last decade, after the tutelage regime was forced to retreat, Turkey embarked on a new era. It was easier then to determine the existence of the military tutelage through the crude and tangible interventions of the military bureaucracy into politics. Pinpointing the existence of the judiciary tutelage, which was assumed to have retreated along with the military tutelage, however, was not as easy.

Besides, the judiciary leads a sheltered existence both in terms of legality and perceptions. The interventions into politics come from the high standpoint of “rule of law,” which itself is in need of serious political, philosophical and moral examination. All attempts at an examination are met with the truism of the “independence of the judiciary.” Besides, the aforementioned “rule of law” and “independence” are invoked in a country which does not have a Constitution that embraces all of its people and one in which only half of all indictments result in convictions.

Dec. 17 has shown the extent of the actions the judiciary tutelage is capable of taking. All files, names and themes, particularly the ones included in the second-wave operation, were enough to make the initiative of the judiciary quite visible. The military tutelage had been a type of tutelage that at its core relied on a primitive discourse and just as primitive armed power. The judiciary tutelage, on the other hand, through its organic relationship with the police, intervenes in politics from a perceived ground of legitimacy. The military tutelage had taken up by itself the duty to construct its desirable citizen shaped by its crude ideological codes. The judiciary tutelage, as the political power that gets to decide who is guilty and who is not, believes it has the right to lecture to the elected actors of politics.

What happened on Dec. 17 was an attempt to intervene in politics with a bomb no one would want to be caught standing near, such as corruption. We found out that public officials whose job it is to find guilty parties and prosecute them have in fact been committing a crime for months. We are facing a joint group from both the police and the judiciary who did not hesitate to commit a crime by instrumentalizing the knowledge of a crime. This group, instead of bringing the guilty parties to justice, chose to wait until when it was in its own best interests to reveal their information.

To state it more clearly, we are talking about a group of people who understand “guilt” and the “guilty” as micro instruments of their macro plan. This fact alone can harm the chances of bringing those who are really guilty of these crimes to justice.

The attempt of Dec. 17 was one which merged diverse topics such as Iran, gold, development, al-Qaeda, finances, politicians and Syria into a single file. A brief glance is enough to show that these files are impossible to reconcile and to see that this issue is not about the law, nor has it ever been.

Not to mention the forced recusal of the investigating prosecutor from the case based on allegations that he accepted a vacation abroad, priced at more than 30,000 dollars, from one of the businessmen the prosecutor indicted. Even if there were any trust in the competency of the judiciary, it is losing that trust pretty fast.