President Erdoğan slams miniskirt-wearing parallel opposition

As the general elections to be held on June 7 loom, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan seems to have no intention of  loosening his grip on the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) - or on daily politics.

Every day, the President Erdoğan finds an occasion to make a speech, which is broadcast live by all news channels. In these speeches he openly campaigns for his former party, in violation of the oath he took when taking over the president’s post.

He continues to campaign in the way he knows best, and which has worked for him and his party in the past: Marginalize the opposition, polarize the nation, make references to Islam and the conservative lifestyle, consolidate your voter base.

Yesterday’s occasion for Erdoğan to send his messages was a ceremony to mark the opening of new dormitories built by the Service for Youth and Education Foundation of Turkey (TÜRGEV). The seven-member board of TÜRGEV includes Erdoğan’s son Bilal Erdoğan and his daughter Esra Albayrak.

The donations and allocations of public land and buildings to the foundation formed a major part of the corruption probe launched on Dec. 17, 2013, and Erdoğan’s attendance at the ceremony was clearly in defiance of that probe, which was dropped after a few months, once all the police officers and prosecutors who conducted the probe were either suspended, fired or assigned to another post by the government.

“TÜRGEV, which they attacked to destroy yesterday, is still here, thank God,” Erdoğan told the audience, arguing that the “parallel state,” a term that Erdoğan and the AKP’s members and supporters love to use for the movement of U.S.-based Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen, was in collaboration with all the opposition parties in parliament.

The way to fight this, according to Erdoğan, is to invest in the youth and “raise pious generations,” as he earlier said.

“Let them [the opposition] raise şakirts [followers of Fethullah Gülen]. Let them cry out for low-cut tops and miniskirts,” Erdoğan said, in a slam of the non-Gülenist opposition, referring to the men who wore miniskirts in Istanbul over the weekend to protest violence against women.

“We will continue our efforts to raise generations devoted to their religion, history, and culture through TÜRGEV and our other foundations and associations,” he added.

So, there is nothing new on the Erdoğan front. He continues from where he left off as a prime minister in his aim to raise pious generations. He continues to ask the citizens to vote for the AKP “to get 400 lawmakers” and change the constitution to allow his Turkish-style presidential system.

He continues with his tactic of polarization, creating an “enemy” for the AKP supporters that they can blame any failure on. He continues to be the dominant force in the ruling party.

One wonders what AKP leader Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu is doing, besides the odd photo opportunity at the army headquarters and the occasional television appearance.