We have a more difficult-to-control Turkey as result of referendum, says Davutoglu’s chief advisor Etienne Mahchupian

The Turkish constitutional referendum results lead the country on a path where the country will be very difficult to control, Etienne Mahchupian, Istanbul-Armenian intellectual, chief advisor of Turkey’s former PM Ahmet Davutolgu told Al Jazeera.

STEPANAKERT, APRIL 17,  ARTSAKHPRESS: “The two parties which presented the constitutional changes proposal jave over 63% votes jointly, however they managed to get only 51% with this referendum. The AKP- MHP coalition failed to give a desirable result. They lost three major cities. All this leads us to a difficult-to-control Turkey”, Mahchupian said.

He stressed that on one hand they will have one person having all powers in his hand, therefore bearing the entire responsibility, and a Cabinet formed around him, a system which have significant impact on both the judicial and legislative systems.

“This situation, frankly speaking, doesn’t seem reasonable. Viewing from the political perspective we see that we have suffered a loss of prudence in Turkey. I am concerned that all this will have negative consequences, which Turkey won’t be able to eliminate easily. The restoration of these consequences might require very long time”, he said.

He also touched upon the close results, saying that a bit more than 50% cannot be considered to be sufficient for constitutional changes.

“We are changing the rules of game, while the half of the society doesn’t wanna play under those rules. Forcing something upon this half can have severe public and political consequences”, he said.

Mahchupian said the results are positive for the Nationalist Movement Party MHP, mentioning that the party has become an important partner of the ruling party.

“From now on the AKP will show it is condemned to MHP. MHP emerged as a winner in this. AKP lost, because what it could have achieved on its own, it achieved with someone else. AKP must learn a lesson from this. As someone who has supported from the beginning and is supporting the AKP, I say this was the biggest mistake of the party up to now”, he said.

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