{"id":252298,"date":"2016-06-27T07:23:09","date_gmt":"2016-06-27T07:23:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/?p=252298"},"modified":"2016-06-27T11:08:23","modified_gmt":"2016-06-27T11:08:23","slug":"252298","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/breaking-news\/252298\/","title":{"rendered":"Turkey\u2019s Scholars Call Erdogan\u2019s Presidency Fraud"},"content":{"rendered":"

Eric Zuesse, originally posted at strategic-culture.org<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

One of the Constitutional requirements to be able to serve as Turkey\u2019s President is to have a college diploma, and Turkey\u2019s association of professors have declared fake the diploma of Turkey\u2019s President, Tayyip Erdogan, which presents him as having graduated from \u201cMarmara University.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

A\u00a0statement published by them on June 8th<\/span><\/a>\u00a0described the multiple possible explanations for irregularities of\u00a0his diploma<\/span><\/a>, then concluded, “But he cannot be represented as a graduate of Marmara University\u201d (or, in the Turkish original of their statement, “Ancak Marmara \u00dcniversitesi mezunu olarak g\u00f6sterilemez”). He can\u2019t, because his diploma is dated 4 March 1981 from the Economic and Administrative Sciences Faculty of Marmara University, and that\u2019s a Faculty which wasn\u2019t even part of Marmara University until 1983; in 1981, it was instead a college independent of the University, and known then only as the Aksaray Academy of Economic and Commercial Sciences. If he had actually possessed a diploma from that college, no \u201cMarmara University\u201d would have been printed on it.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

So, he has always been misrepresenting himself by saying that, in 1981, he\u00a0“received a Business Administration degree from the Aksaray School of\u00a0Economics and Commercial Sciences (Marmara University)\u201d<\/span><\/a>. He has presented no authentic evidence that he graduated from any college at all. Consequently, the professors\u2019 association wrote, “This is bad practice, because the president is not a graduate of Marmara University ‘Aksaray School of\u00a0Economics and Commercial Sciences\u2019\u201d \u2014 definitely<\/i> not of Marmara University (which didn\u2019t even exist<\/i> until 28 March 1982), and probably<\/i> not of Aksaray School of\u00a0Economics and Commercial Sciences either (though it could be<\/i> that he was, but that he had lost his diploma from there, and \u2014 being a psychopath \u2014 forged the one that he now shows, so as not to be declared illegal to run for, or serve as, the President of Turkey).<\/span><\/p>\n

The\u00a0relevant provision of the Turkish Constitution<\/span><\/a>,\u00a0in its original 1982 version, is:<\/span><\/p>\n

ARTICLE 101.\u00a0The President of the Republic shall be elected for a term\u00a0of office of seven years by the Turkish Grand National Assembly from\u00a0among its own members who are over 40 years of age and <\/i>who have\u00a0completed their higher education<\/i><\/b> or from among Turkish citizens who\u00a0fulfil these requirements and are eligible to be deputies.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

In 2007, that was revised to<\/a><\/span>: \u201cThe President of the Republic shall be elected by the public from among the Turkish Grand National Assembly members who are over 40 years of age and <\/i>have completed higher education<\/i><\/b> or from among ordinary Turkish citizens who fulfill these requirements and are eligible to be deputies. The president’s term of office shall be five years. The President of the Republic can be elected to two terms at most.\u201d<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

This provision wasn\u2019t present in\u00a0the original Ataturk Constitution of 1924<\/span><\/a>, but became present in\u00a0the 1961 Constitution<\/span><\/a>,\u00a0where its form was: \u201cARTICLE 95 \u2014 The President of the Turkish Republic shall be elected for a term of seven years from among those members of the Turkish Grand National Assembly who have completed their fortieth year and <\/i>received higher education<\/i><\/b>.”<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

So, during the period of 1924-1961, there was no such educational requirement, in order for a person to be able to run for and serve as the President.<\/span><\/p>\n

This issue for Erdogan didn\u2019t exist until he entered the Grand National Assembly in 2003; but, after that time, he was contending for the Presidency, which he finally won in 2014, and the professors\u2019 association is saying that he occupies that office illegally.<\/span><\/p>\n

An article in\u00a0Al-Monitor<\/span><\/a>,\u00a0on June 15th, was titled\u00a0“Is Erdogan’s university diploma forged?\u201d<\/span><\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Cengiz \u00c7andar wrote: \u201cIf it turns out Erdogan was never qualified to be elected president, whatever he has signed or implemented would have\u00a0to be considered null and void from a purely legal point of view.\u201d The professors\u2019 association avoided addressing the governmental and political implications of their saying, “But he cannot be represented as a graduate of Marmara University.\u201d At the end of\u00a0\u00c7andar’s article was also this about the governmental implications: “It is mind-boggling. But if Erdogan’s diploma ends up being a forgery, even\u00a0Turkey’s cowed media<\/span><\/a>\u00a0will not be able to ignore or avoid the explosive\u00a0scandal that would result, with all its international dimensions.\u201d Now that Erdogan\u2019s\u00a0\u2018diploma\u2019\u00a0clearly is<\/i> a forgery (or has, in so many words, been nailed as being such, by the professors\u2019\u00a0association), and the only remaining question is therefore whether he lost an authentic one (and so he\u2019s simply a psychopathic liar who had goofed), people are waiting to see if an authentic one exists. Perhaps instead, however, the issue will just fade away, since most Turks apparently tolerate dictatorship if it\u2019s one they happen to agree with. (Otherwise, Erdogan wouldn\u2019t even be<\/i> in his present office.)<\/span><\/p>\n

Marmara University has been placed into an awkward position by Erdogan\u2019s forgery. Anadolu Agency, which is Turkey\u2019s government-run equivalent of America\u2019s Associated Press, headlined on 26 January 2013,\u00a0\u201c130th Anniversary of Marmara University:<\/span><\/a>\u00a0Marmara University decorated Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan\u00a0with an honorary doctorate degree,\u201d but no mention was made then of Erdogan\u2019s having claimed to have studied at MU, even though his having \u2018graduated\u2019 from that University (which, as was previously mentioned, never even had that name, until 1982) was, among Turks, a point of prestige for the University. Until recently, the University had simply basked quietly in the President\u2019s glow. But Marmara University\u2019s Catalog<\/span><\/a> during the year 1995-96, in the catalog\u2019s section \u201cHistory of the University\u201d did make note of one relevant fact here: that, “In accordance with the Act 2800, of November 6, 1981, The Istanbul Academy of Economics and Commercial\u00a0Sciences was finally recognized as [named] Marmara University in July 25, 1982.\u201d So, even the University cannot reasonably deny that something is wrong with Erdogan\u2019s \u2018diploma\u2019.<\/span><\/p>\n

On 3 June 2016, a new website \u201cTurkish Minute\u201d<\/span><\/a>, which had started operation shortly after Erdogan on 5 March 2016 arrested and charged with treason<\/span><\/a> the top management at Turkey\u2019s largest (and often critical of Erdogan) newspaper, Today\u2019s Zaman<\/i>, headlined \u201cMarmara University rector confirms Erdo\u011fan is a graduate\u201d<\/span><\/a>, and that report presenting the government\u2019s line, might have helped to precipitate the collective statement from the professors\u2019 association, explaining why the diploma was actually fake. Then, on June 18th, a blogger, \u201cufilter,\u201d headlined \u201cThe story of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan\u2019s fake degree and diploma\u201d<\/span><\/a>, and provided yet additional<\/i> details of its fakery, and further mentioned that at least two investigative journalists, in separate incidents, had recently died, suddenly and mysteriously, soon after having released their reports pointing out problems with Erdogan\u2019s \u2018diploma\u2019. So, when Cengiz \u00c7andar, on June 15th, referred to \u201cTurkey\u2019s cowed media,\u201d there was apparently good reason for them to be<\/i> \u201ccowed.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

WHO, REALLY, IS TAYYIP ERDOGAN?<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

According to all of the latest independent reports, Erdogan\u2019s claims to having had anything of a secular education are entirely bogus, because the only education that he unquestionably did have was his k-12 education, all of which was at Islamic schools, where he learned to read, and did read, the Quran. These were schools that prepare boys for the clergy. In fact, one of the reasons why Article 101 of Turkey\u2019s Constitution requires the President to have a college degree is that k-12 schooling in Turkey prior to Ataturk was Quranic<\/span><\/a>. Only post-high-school education then had some secular control. Though Erdogan grew up in Ataturk\u2019s imposed secular Turkey, he seems all along to have been simply a closeted fundamentalist Sunni, who rose in politics because the Turkish public favored that, more than they favored Ataturk\u2019s imposed separation of church-and-state. And now, even the EU is dependent upon Turkey, to absorb as many of the refugees as possible from the U.S.-Saudi (and their jihadists) invasions of Syria, Libya, etc. (which invasions are aimed to overthrow leaders who are allied with Russia, but also to spread the Islamic faith, in precisely the Salafist-Wahhabist Sunni variety that the Sauds especially champion).<\/span><\/p>\n

As\u00a0Foreign Affairs<\/i> reported<\/span><\/a>, on 23 December 2015, about Erdogan\u2019s Turkey: \u201cStudents who perform poorly on entrance exams for secondary school are shunted into imam\u2013hatips where they study the Koran for up to 13 hours a week and take courses on the life of the Prophet Muhammad and Arabic [the language of the Quran]. Erdogan has boasted that during his tenure as president, enrollment in these schools soared from 63,000 to over one million.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Erdogan is part of a broader fundamentalist movement in Turkey to end the country\u2019s secularism and return Turkey to its sectarian, Ottoman, past. Here<\/span><\/a> is the way that one fundamentalist Muslim phrased the matter in a speech addressing American fundamentalist Christians in Colorado, on 14 November 1998, encouraging them in their fight for a statutorily Christian America to replace the existing secular U.S. Constitution and system of government: \u201cReligiosity went underground. While many Turks did lose their faith [after Ataturk\u2019s reforms,] \u2026 many others simply feigned a loss of faith. (On my first visit to Turkey a student told me that he did not let his professors know that he prayed five times a day because he wanted to get a job after he graduated.)\u201d Erdogan\u2019s fake college diploma is part of that \u201cunderground\u201d operation, to return Turkey to its previous system. Violating a secular Constitution is no sin, but a virtue, to believers in the view that law comes only from God, never from humans; i.e., not from democracy, the public, but from God<\/i>. Thus, for Erdogan to violate section 101 of Turkey\u2019s Constitution, is acceptable to people who believe the way he does (i.e., as a religious fundamentalist). It\u2019s what had won him the Presidency.<\/span><\/p>\n

The President of Turkey is globally important. Turkey is a crucial member of the Western alliance \u2014 the countries allied with the U.S. against Russia \u2014 because it\u2019s the single bridge between both the NATO alliance of anti-Russia countries (essentially, the U.S. and the EU), and the anti-Russia GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council) alliance of\u00a0fundamentalist Sunni Islamic Sharia-law oil kingdoms against Russia: Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE, Kuwait, Bahrain, and Oman. Turkey is the only Islamic nation that\u2019s both a member of NATO, and also a fundamentalist Sunni Islamic, and (under Erdogan) increasingly Sharia law, nation. (Unlike the others, Turkey has no oil of its own, however.) So: Erdogan is the regional bridge between America\u2019s NATO military alliance, and the Sauds’ GCC military alliance. The only other such bridge (though not merely<\/i> regional) is America\u2019s President, Barack Obama, who is, in a sense, an even bigger<\/i> such bridge than Erdogan is: the U.S. President is the glue that holds the entire anti-Russia alliance together globally. Consequently, if Turkey\u2019s regime collapses, then America\u2019s regime might be the only remaining such geostrategic north-south bridge, holding together both<\/i> ends of America\u2019s anti-Russia alliance: otherwise known as the Western alliance. And, of course, with Pacific allies such as Japan and Australia, the U.S. truly is the uniquely global superpower. But, if Erdogan falls, then an even heavier geostrategic burden will become placed on America, and the Sauds will consequently be even more dependent upon the U.S. than they now are. Perhaps they\u2019ll then need to reduce their funding to terrorist groups<\/span><\/a> (such as they have always been requested to do, in private<\/span><\/a>). From the Sauds\u2019 standpoint, a return of Turkey back to its former Ataturk secularism, away from Turkey\u2019s more recent Erdogan Sunni sectarianism, would thus likely be quite unwelcomed. Furthermore, how would the U.S., Sauds, Qatar\u2019s Thanis, etc., then be able to get their weapons and jihadists into Syria to bring down and replace the secular Shiite ally of Russia who now leads that country: Bashar al-Assad?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

So, Erdogan\u2019s diploma-problem could turn out to have considerable global significance. If his diploma-problem fades away, then Turkey\u2019s dictatorship will be established quite firmly, and Turkey\u2019s Constitution will be empty verbiage, but Erdogan\u2019s supporters will probably be even more passionate for him than they now are, because of their fears of the demons that he trumpets: Kurds<\/span><\/a>, Shiites<\/span><\/a>, etc. He\u2019s an ordinary tyrant, in an extraordinary position, and thus is a tyrant with extraordinarily many foreign allies. That might pull him through.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of\u00a0 They\u2019re Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010<\/i><\/span><\/a>,<\/i> and of<\/span> \u00a0<\/i>CHRIST\u2019S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity<\/i><\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Eric Zuesse, originally posted at strategic-culture.org One of the Constitutional requirements to be able to serve as Turkey\u2019s President is to have a college diploma, and Turkey\u2019s association of professors have declared fake the diploma of Turkey\u2019s President, Tayyip Erdogan, which presents him as having graduated from \u201cMarmara University.\u201d A\u00a0statement published by them on June […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1254,"featured_media":252300,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[487],"tags":[30,1036,96,1035,4813,93,535,907,59,757,524,754,1261],"class_list":{"0":"post-252298","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-breaking-news","8":"tag-big-brother","9":"tag-breaking-news","10":"tag-cover-up","11":"tag-daily-news","12":"tag-erdogan","13":"tag-eu","14":"tag-global-news","15":"tag-isis","16":"tag-military","17":"tag-nato","18":"tag-russia","19":"tag-syria","20":"tag-turkey"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252298","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1254"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252298"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252298\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/252300"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252298"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252298"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252298"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}