Erdogan: éloquente définition de la démocratie

Trouvé dans un article de Douglas Murray @ The Spectator cette phrase du premier ministre turc Recep Tayyip Erdogan sur la démocratie, prononcée lorsqu'il était maire d'Istanbul:  "la démocratie, c’est comme un autobus, on en descend à l’arrivée".  Egalement citée par Christopher Caldwell dans le New York Times et par Sinem Karatas sur Arte.

Ci-dessous les extraits de l'article de Douglas Murray intitulé Israël assiégé concernant les rapports de la Turquie islamiste avec Israël:

"There has been no Arab Spring in Turkey, but it too is changing. Until recently this was the country which could be held up as a demonstration of how political progress and Islamist politics might successfully be separated. Yet since the election of Recep Tayyip Erdogan in 2003, relations have been hurtling backwards. From enjoying political and even security co-operation with Israel, Turkey went to locking up journalists and any other critics who stood against its Islamist trajectory.

As one of the first Islamists to be appointed through the ballot-box, Erdogan views democracy in the same light as the Brotherhood. By his own famous admission, democracy is like a bus or tram, ‘You ride it until you arrive at your destination, then you step off.’ Over time, Erdogan’s branch of Islamist politics allowed free movement of the Muslim Brotherhood in Turkey and a warming of relations — including meetings — with Hamas.

Pacifiste turc...

After a long period of deterioration, relations with Israel reached a low in 2010 when, in a deliberate act of provocation, a flotilla sailed to Gaza from Turkey in an effort to break the blockade Israel imposed to prevent weapon-running to Hamas. Israeli forces boarded one of the vessels and, in the ensuing fight, nine Turkish activists were killed. If the Israelis thought that was the nadir of their new relations with Turkey, they were mistaken.

During recent hostilities, Erdogan carefully and deliberately described Israel as a ‘terrorist state’, claiming in addition that Israel had carried out a ‘massacre of children’ in Gaza. The following day the Turkish foreign minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, took his turn to travel in solidarity to Gaza, joined by other foreign ministers of the Arab League. Just two months ago Erdogan described in a speech how Turkey’s democracy was an ‘example’ for the Islamic world. His words, seemingly self-aggrandising at the time, now appear to be true. It may nearly be time to step off the bus."

Ce qui n'empêche pas Jacques Delors de continuer à soutenir l'adhésion de la Turquie à l'Union européenne.  Il "se montre très critique vis-à-vis du refus franco-allemand d'envisager l'intégration de la Turquie dans l'Union. "On n'aurait pas du dire non avant de réellement négocier ". S'il reconnaît la complexité du sujet, l'adhésion de la Turquie semble, selon lui, le meilleur moyen de donner tort aux partisans du "clash des civilisations". [...] très applaudi par son auditoire à la recherche d'une nouvelle "vision pour l'Europe"."  En effet, la vision pour une Europe en pleine crise: misère, chômage, insécurité, désunion....