ANKARA - The veteran leader of Turkey's main opposition party resigned on Monday, saying he was the victim of a government conspiracy following the release of an video purporting to show him and a woman in a bedroom.
The resignation of Deniz Baykal, a fierce critic of the ruling Islamist-leaning AK Party, comes as his secularist Republican People’s Party (CHP) has pledged to block plans by the government to hold a referendum on constitutional reforms.
Baykal accused the AK Party, whose roots lie in political Islam, of having knowledge of the videotape, which has been widely circulated on the Internet.
"This is not about a tape, this is a conspiracy," Baykal, 71, told a packed news conference as some party aides cried.
"This kind of illegal activity carried out on the leader of the main opposition party could not have been done without the knowledge of the government," he said.
Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, who is preparing to call a referendum on constitutional reforms to overhaul the judiciary and make the army answerable to civilian courts, denied his government had anything to do with the video and accused Baykal of trying to make politics out of his personal life.
"I didn’t watch the video myself, but after hearing about it I did my best to have it deleted from all Internet sources. Trying to blame us is delirious," Erdogan said."
The government says the reform package is needed to meet European Union entry demands. Secularist critics say it is a furtive attempt by the AK Party to seize control of all levers of state and undermine Turkey’s secularist constitution.
Baykal has said the CHP will ask the Constitutional Court to block the referendum, expected to take place in July after Erdogan won parliamentary approval for the package last week.
The videotape, posted on YouTube late last week, shows a man who looks like Baykal in his underwear getting dressed in a bedroom with a woman who also appears half-naked.
Baykal is married. Turkish media says the woman in the tape looks like a married lawmaker and former aide to Baykal.
CHANGE OF THE OLD GUARD
Founded by Kemal Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey, the CHP is the voice of the urban secularist elite that includes judges, generals and state bureaucrats.
Baykal had led the party since 1992.
The CHP is accused by critics of being out of touch with a changing Turkey. It has often blocked EU-driven reforms, while it accuses the AK Party of having a hidden Islamist agenda.
The CHP is due to hold a national congress this month, and some political analysts did not rule out the chance of Baykal seeking re-selection, despite public enthusiasm for a change.
"People want to see new faces at CHP leadership… A change of leadership will add dynamism to the party," said Adnan Celik, 23, a cashier at an Istanbul bookstore.
Turkish share prices, bonds and the lira currency enjoyed a big bounce on Monday thanks to a $1 trillion EU and IMF rescue package for neighbouring Greece, announced over the weekend and designed to lessen the risk of debt crisis contagion in Europe.
Investors, however, are watching any hint of a political crisis developing in Turkey in the run-up to the referendum. There was no reaction to Baykal’s resignation, though it reinforced a sense of uncertainty over Turkey’s politics.
The AK Party swept traditional parties, tainted by allegations of graft and mismanagement, from power in 2002. It denies harbouring Islamist ambitions.
Critics say Baykal’s domination of the CHP had stifled chances for younger politicians who could have made the party more progressive and appealing to Turkish voters.
Analysts said his departure could energise the CHP before a general election, due by July 2011, when the AK party will bid for a third term in power.
"A common complaint in Turkey has been that the ruling AK party’s main strength has been the absence of a credible opposition," Timothy Ash, from Royal Bank of Scotland, said in a note.
