Cumhuriyet editors assess İnce's manifesto

The assessments by Cumhuriyet editors Figen Atalay, Mine Esen, Emre Deveci and Arif Kızılyalın of the treatment given to education, foreign policy, economy and sport in İnce's manifesto are as follow:

 EDUCATION: KEY POINTS POSITIVE BUT WHAT ABOUT THE FIGURES?

 EDUCATION EDITOR FİGEN ATALAY: I think the education section in the manifesto was kept short and so it is unclear how a great many problems are to be solved. The most important problem in education in Turkey is inequality of opportunity. There is a huge quality difference between two equivalent schools, or even two classes in the same school, but it is unclear from the manifesto how each child will be afforded access to quality education. In my view, a few sentences were called for as to how all schools would be brought to the same level in quality terms.

I was saddened at being unable to see conclusions and solutions regarding children who have to work, agricultural labourer children, children who have been driven to crime and are in prison and children living on the streets. How are the problems of children who are unable to get education and non-attendance to be solved? These are absent from the manifesto. The Transition from Primary to Secondary Education Exam has ended and the system to replace it has increased children’s worries but there is no section about the exam system, either. Will this system continue? Will it end? We do not know! Things such as preschool education becoming compulsory, the opportunities that will be afforded to teachers, youth grants and autonomy for universities are certainly very positive, but, for example, the figures troubled me. Why will 10,000 students be sent abroad? If only, rather than speaking of 10,000, this had been expressed in more down-to-earth terms such as “successful” or “deserving.” Is there a need for 100,000 computer engineers? If such an analysis has been conducted, all well and good, but is there no need for engineers in other areas? In a poor country like ours, it was also a nice touch, while speaking of full-day education, to state that “all children will be given a free lunch.” The issue of hourly-paid teachers has been forgotten. The pledge to give a bonus to all educational workers on 24 November including service staff and not just teachers was most befitting for a social democratic leader.

 DIPLOMACY: STRESS ON PEACEFUL POLICIES IMPORTANT

 FOREIGN NEWS EDITOR MİNE ESEN: The stress that the CHP’s presidential candidate Muharrem İnce has made in his electoral manifesto that, “Our unwavering principle in foreign policy will once more be ‘Peace at home, peace in the world” is certainly most valuable when contemplation is given to today’s environment in which there is no let-up in global-scale conflict, political and economic crises and the drums of war.

 However, questions abound as to how this will be fleshed out and how it is to be realised in an environment whose prevailing reality is one in which under the AKP government its rhetoric of “zero problems with neighbours” finds reflection on the ground to the contrary in various crises and military gambits. There is a need to say, “Look at Syria, Iraq and developments in Iran” in this regard. It must be accepted that Turkey is now at the very heart of the Middle Eastern turmoil that for decades it avoided becoming party to. The area is a kind of minefield in which global actors are involved as much as regional actors. Ankara’s foreign policy constraints are not restricted purely to the Middle Eastern region. With relations with the US undergoing one of their most problematic periods, the tension with the EU is in plain view.

 İnce’s pledge to target a solution to the half-century Cyprus problem is also noteworthy. If it is recalled that views stretching from talk out of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and Ankara on certain fronts that “different positions must be adopted vis a vis the Greek Cypriot Sector that buttresses itself with the EU” to “two separate states – a confederation - must be established on the island” have found more frequent expression of late it is also worthwhile recalling that the struggle with an eye on the Eastern Mediterranean energy basin has heated up further in Cyprus waters. In this context, there is high tension between Ankara and the EU, which positions itself on the side of its members Greece and the South Cyprus Greek Cypriot Sector. On the other hand, though, premising the issue purely on steps to be taken by Ankara does not suffice for the problems to be dispelled. The tension between the EU and US and clashes of interest coming into plain view further fuel interpretations that the transatlantic alliance is cracking. With the EU in any case drowning in its internal problems, it is, on the other hand, going through the pangs of divorce with Britain. The pledge, in the global village in which the world’s nerves have truly been brought to an edge, of a return to Atatürk’s principle of “Peace at home, peace in the world” that inspired Turkey’s conventional foreign policy creates hope and inspiration. But, as to how the knots are to be untied one by one in the mesh of such intertangled global problems, this brings to the fore the need for intelligent diplomatic moves that will bring long-term, not instant, planning and options to the table.

 ECONOMY: STRUCTURAL ISSUES NOT FORGOTTEN

 ECONOMICS EDITOR EMRE DEVECİ: The CHP’s presidential candidate Muharrem İnce announced his electoral manifesto today. As expected, considerable space is devoted in the manifesto to items relating to the economy. Since the signs of crisis in the Turkish economy are gradually intensifying and economic problems have become society’s most burning issue, there is interest as to what the opposition will pledge in this area. As İnce has indicated, there are huge structural problems in the economy such as import dependence in industry, energy and agriculture, the current-account deficit, inflation, interest rates, unemployment, poverty, indebtedness and the focus on consumption not production. The outstanding external debt of 129.6 billion dollars in 2002 has become 453 billion dollars as of September 2017. As to the loans that have been taken out, these have been buried in concrete and not production. The seven-year total of investments in construction amounts to 551 billion dollars. The finance that Turkey must find in one year is some 240 billion dollars. Turkey must rapidly wean itself away from foreign loans, construction, imports and an economy based on low technology. The current economic model has gone bust and radical steps must be taken.

 It is stated in İnce's manifesto, pointing to the need for a new economic model, that the current-account deficit, currently around 6%, will be reduced to 3%, as will inflation, which reached 10.85% on an annual basis in April, to 5% and unemployment, which stood at 10.6% in March, to 7%. Included among targets is that of increasing per-capita national income, which was 10,597 dollars in 2017, to 15,000 dollars. There is a pledge to raise the minimum wage, currently 1603 lira, to 2,200 lira. There is talk of exports doubling within five years. This means the target is for exports of 157 billion dollars in 2017 to exceed 300 billion dollars in 2023. There are targets to increase tourism income, standing at 26.2 billion dollars in 2017, to 60 billion dollars and the number of tourists, amounting to 32.4 million, to 60 million. To this end, per-capita tourist expenditure must increase from 681 dollars to 1000 dollars. Among notable promises in the manifesto are those for ending import dependence in agriculture and husbandry, farmers being provided with diesel at three lira and reversal of the decision to privatise the sugar factories.

 One of the Turkish economy’s problems is also the gradual moving away from the Industry 4.0 goal with investments concentrated on low-technology sectors and the collapse in education. The high-technology share of total investments in the manufacturing sector is around one per cent. There is a stress in the manifesto on an orientation towards high-value-added and high-technology areas. Despite high incentives, the private sector in Turkey is not orientating towards high-value-added and high-technology sectors. It is consequently not really possible to attain the goals that İnce mentions with the market economy as it currently functions. The public sector must act as the pioneer in this area by making large investments.

 No mention has been made in the manifesto of public-private cooperation projects that have provoked much debate and have imposed a heavy burden on the budget. This is also an issue that is sparking debate in the world. Some countries forbid public-private cooperation projects. As you know, many projects from the third bridge to the third airport and city hospitals to the gulf bridge were carried out with loans taken from state banks and guaranteed crossings, passengers and patients given in dollars. According to Development Ministry data, the total contract value of public-private cooperation projects amounts to 129.5 billion dollars. As to the investment value of these contracts, it is 58.6 billion dollars, equivalent to around 45% of the contract value. So, the state waives income of 129.5 billion dollars that will enter its coffers from bridges, airports, highways and harbours for 20-25 years and says to the private sector, “Come and invest 59 billion dollars. Find loans and you do it.” Moreover, it guarantees the income and the loans. A total of 6.2 billion lira have been allocated in the budget for payments committed to under these projects.in the 2018 budget. There is a need to revise these contracts to reduce the budget deficit.

 A shortcoming that catches my eye is the lack of mention of tax injustice. Turkey is one of the countries in the world that is in the worst position in this regard. Of taxes totalling 536 billion lira that were collected in 2017, 360 billion came from indirect taxes, most notably VAT and Special Consumption Tax. Corporations paid 52 billion lira, and wage earners 67. A wide-ranging tax reform is essential for a fair distribution. There is a need to reduce the tax burden on the poor, especially by reducing indirect tax, and increasing the tax levied on the rich.

 SPORT: THOSE WITH CLOSE CONNECTIONS TO THE FAMILY WILL NOT BECOME CHAMPION

 CUMHURİYET SPORT EDITOR ARİF KIZILYALIN: Presidential candidate Mr İnce has taken an important step by mentioning sport in his election manifesto, because sport has virtually been relegated to the background in politics since 2003. Mr İnce has given the good tidings that there will be an end to this business in which merit counts for nothing and there is a departure from the law and justice and there will be a straightening out of the pumped-up dirty state of affairs in football. It appears that, if İnce comes to power, federation chairs in Turkey will be chosen in genuine and not sham elections. Those with close connections to the family will not set up clubs and contest the league championship. And, for sure, the Passolig system, unequalled in the world, will be thrown in the dustbin of history.

 Cumhuriyet editörleri İnce'nin manifestosunu değerlendirdi