“If they had no impact on our daily lives, mental health, peace and future of our kids, we would be able to watch the developments of this country as if they were part of an action film with elements of horror,” wrote Oya Baydar in her column. She is perfectly right. Even the agenda of last few years is busy enough to have a profound impact on the moods even of ordinary people…

Baydar prefers to like Turkey’s story to a “tragedy- and horror-stained action film,” but I find it closer to the comedy-horror” genre in which Mel Brooks ridicules Alfred Hitchcock’s famous horror films.

There is a Kurdish issue which no one can deny as well as a ‘Settlement Process’ developed to tackle with this problem. By remaining silent about the process which is being conducted between the ruling party and Kurds’ political leaders and Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Öcalan –who is serving his life term in İmralı island off the coast İstanbul– and by not asking the questions that pop up in their minds, people lend great support to it, and they do this in order not to return to the days of clashes which claimed the lives of tens of thousands and wounded hundreds of thousands. However, although he has exerted great efforts to maintain this process, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan made a sharp deviation from his former stance and said: “What have you not got, brother? Did you have a president [of Kurdish background]? Yes, you did. Did you have a prime minister [of Kurdish background]? Yes, you did. Did you have ministers [of Kurdish background]? Yes, you did. Do you have [Kurds] in the top bureaucracy? Yes, you have. Do you have [Kurds] in the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK)? Yes. What else do you want? What do you want? For God’s sake, what don’t you have that we do? You have everything.”

Even before we have time to accept and internalize this speech, we hear reports of a new delegation heading for İmralı to meet Öcalan and a committee of observers being in the works.

There remains the fact that the language and tone of this speech is extremely problematic. President employs a divisive tone so amply as he addresses Kurds that one is urged to think that this style can hardly produce peace!

It is obvious that President wields this rhetoric in an effort to secure nationalist voters’ support for his presidential system dreams in the elections slated for June 7. He has already gone a step further to announce his intention to administer Turkey like an incorporated company. Of course, for the time being, we don’t know if he intends to be the CEO or the chairman of the executive board in this corporation. Moreover, the fact that the ruling party places emphasis on the money invested in counter-terrorism efforts rather than on the loss of mutual trust and human resources in any debate on the costs of terrorism is proof that the government already sees Turkey as an incorporated company.

Thus, we learn that the ruling party’s 2003 government program emphatically used the phrase ‘market society’ instead of ‘market economy’ and this was no coincidence and the super presidential system its seeks to introduce will replace legal rules with principles of corporate management. Of course, such a setting will have no room for democracy, multivocality and multiculturalism. The aims, methods and corporate culture of a company will be dictated from top to bottom.

The only requirement for implementing this plan is to ensure that the ruling party secures over 330 seats in Parliament in the elections of June 7. Thus, the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) emerges of the pivotal party of the upcoming elections. Will we be the employees for the Turkey Inc. or citizens for the Republic of Turkey in the post-election period? The HDP holds the key to this question.

HDP’s co-chair Selahattin Demirtaş answered this question in the most clear and open manner at a speech he delivered during his party’s latest parliamentary group meeting. “This system no longer fits us. A presidential system is a leadership system. Actually, this is the system in ancient statecraft traditions,” Erdoğan had said. But Demirtaş countered him saying: “Mr. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, as long as the HDP exists, as long as HDP members breathe in this land, you will not be the president [under a presidential system].”

The people who are concerned about what the nearing elections will bring were particularly curious about how the HDP –which is still not certain to pass the election threshold– would define itself and how it would start to appeal to the entire country as part of the ongoing negotiations… Aware of these concerns, in the party’s shortest-ever meeting, Demirtaş assured that they will become an essential player in Turkey’s democratization. With this move, Demirtaş has assumed the heavy responsibility of promoting Kurds’ demands for rights and freedoms as well as Turkey’s quest for being a democratic country governed by rule of law.

Indeed, a lasting solution to the Kurdish issue is possible only if Turkey becomes a true democratic state guided by rule of law. The reverse is also true… However, this move by Demirtaş will extremely bother President and his entourage who dream of establishing his super presidential system after the elections. For this reason, it wouldn’t be a surprise if the tension rises and violence steps into the political arena as the election date nears. The HDP will emerge as a key player in Turkish democracy to the extent it can prevent such an environment. But until June 7, we will be watching mostly a Mel Brooks film styled á la Hitchcock as we try to make sense of developments.