MHP ready to take government responsibility if conditions met: Bahçeli

ANKARA

Cihan Photo

The nationalist opposition party leader has expressed his party’s readiness to take the responsibility to form a coalition government with the Justice and Development Party (AKP) if their conditions are met. 

“In the presence of everybody I openly list our conditions for the coalition,” Devlet Bahçeli, leader of the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), told his party at a meeting in the Central Anatolian town of Tokat late July 30. “If you accept our proposals and write them down in a protocol then we will shoulder the responsibility. Would the AKP swear on the Quran if it would accept all our conditions? The MHP will surely do it,” he stressed. 

Bahçeli’s statement came hours after Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu revealed they were in close contact with the MHP, although talks with the Republican People’s Party (CHP) to form a government were still underway. 

The five points Bahçeli underlined were as follows: 

No concessions on the first four articles of the constitution; the unitary structure of Turkey will be protected with its capital as Ankara and its language as Turkish.

The fight against the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) will continue in the entire country as well as in the southeastern Anatolian region.

The PKK will dissolve itself; it will surrender all its weapons and innocent members of the PKK will go to their homes while those who have committed crimes will be prosecuted and be sentenced. 

The corruption cases of Dec. 17 and Dec. 25, 2013, which includes four former ministers, will be re-opened. Everybody including President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s son, Bilal Erdoğan, will be tried over corruption claims. 

The Kurdish peace process will be discarded.