Muslims Should Learn from Erdogan

Erdogan

In secular Turkey, Erdogan was raised a practicing Muslim. He had the dream of returning Turkey to the path of ALLAH even at a time when speaking in favour of an Islamic society was a taboo. 

Erdogan started his political career as a student when he joining the National Turkish Student Union which was an anti-communist action group. In 1976,
he became the head of the Beyoğlu youth branch of the Islamist National Salvation Party (MSP) and was later promoted to chair of the Istanbul youth branch of the party. 

After the 1980 military coup, Erdoğan followed most of Necmettin Erbakan's followers into the Islamist Welfare Party. He became the party's Beyoğlu district chair in 1984, and in 1985 he became the chair of the Istanbul city branch. He was elected to parliament in 1991, but barred from taking his seat. He joined main stream politics in 1994 when he won 25.19% of popular votes to become the mayor of Istanbul. 

As an agent of Islamization, Erdogan looked at the community holistically. He was not all about enforcing the Shariah penal code; he was wise enough to recognize that catering for the welfare of the community is also an Islamic duty. 

He was also wise enough to observe that a great number of Muslims have been made to believe that nothing good comes from the full practice of Islam but chaos hence, any move to establish a fully Islamic state is viewed with skepticism by even Muslims.

He impacted the lives of the citizens but at the same time, always made it apparent that he was inclined to Islam. With this, it sunk into the minds of people that a devout Muslim can bring progress to the community. From his days as Prime minister and now as President, Erdogan has always made welfare his tool for the Islamization of Turkey and it has been working just fine.

The vast majority of Turks love and support Erdogan so much that they are willing to give their lives for Erdogan to remain in power. A coup attempt against Erdogan on the 15th of July 2016 failed when Turks in their millions poured onto the streets to repel the rebellious soldiers. A total of 265 Turks gave their lives to retain Erdogan as their leader.

If Erdogan declares a fully Islamic state in Turkey today, the vast majority will be behind even though skirmishes would ensue here and there seriously damaging the massive Islamic successes that have been made in the last 15 years. 

Here are some achievements of Erdogan as a politician in Turkey

ECONOMY

• Erdoğan inherited a debt of $23.5 billion to the IMF, which was reduced to $0.9 billion in 2012. He decided not to sign a new deal. Turkey's debt to the IMF was thus declared to be completely paid and he announced that the IMF could borrow from Turkey.
• In 2011, Erdoğan's government made legal reforms to return properties of Christian and Jewish minorities which were seized by the Turkish government in the 1930s. The total value of the properties returned reached $2 billion (USD).
• The cash-flow into the Turkish economy between 2002 and 2012 caused a growth of 64% in real GDP and a 43% increase in GDP per capita.
• In 2002, the Turkish Central Bank had $26.5 billion in reserves. This amount reached $92.2 billion in 2011.
• During Erdoğan's leadership, inflation fell from 32% to 9.0% in 2004.

EDUCATION

• Erdoğan increased the budget of the Ministry of Education from 7.5 billion lira in 2002 to 34 billion lira in 2011, the highest share of the national budget given to one ministry. Before his premiership the military received the highest share of the national budget.
• Compulsory education was increased from eight years to twelve.
• In 2003, the Turkish government, together with UNICEF, started a campaign called "Come on girls, let's go to school!” The goal of this campaign was to close the gender-gap in primary school enrollment through the provision of a quality basic education for all girls.
• In 2004, textbooks became free of charge and since 2008 every province in Turkey has its own university.
• During Erdoğan's Premiership, the number of universities in Turkey nearly doubled, from 98 in 2002 to 186 in October 2012.

INFRASTRUCTURE

• Under Erdoğan's government, the number of airports in Turkey increased from 26 to 50.
• Between the founding of the Republic of Turkey in 1923 and 2002, there had been 6000 km of dual carriageway roads created. Between 2002 and 2011, another 13500 km of expressway were built.
• Despite a growing population, the number of auto crashes reduced by 50 percent.
• The construction of Marmaray, an undersea rail tunnel under the Bosphorus strait, started in 2004. When completed, it will be the world's deepest undersea immersed tube tunnel.

These successes have earned Erdogan opportunities to convert Turkey from a secular-Islamophobic state to not just an Islamophilic one but a prominent one in the defense of Islamic rights across the globe.

Islamic feats of Erdogan

• Erdogan lifted the hijab ban on university campuses in 2010. Female students were allowed to wear hijab in state institutions from 2013 and in high school in 2014. Since October 2013, female parliamentarians have been allowed to wear hijab in parliament.
• On 30th August 2015, Turkey’s first hijab wearing minister, Ayse Gurcan, was sworn into the cabinet as the Minister of Family and Social Policy. In August 2016, Turkey allowed female police officers to wear the headscarf as part of their uniform.  Civilians employed by the armed forces have been able to wear the hijab since 2016 and in 2017 the Erdogan led government commenced plans to allow women in the armed forces to wear hijab.
• Under Erdoğan, the Turkish government tightened the laws on the sale and consumption of alcohol, banning all advertising and increasing the tax on alcoholic beverages.
• The Turkish government under Erdogan took it upon itself to train and export imams to other European countries to propagate Islam.
• Erdogan is also an outspoken critic of the Zionists’ oppression of Palestinians. On several occasions, Erdogan has openly called Israeli Prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, a terrorist for his overseeing the murder of Palestinian.
• Erdogan deems the government of al Sisi in Egypt an illegitimate one for monstrously overthrowing the Islamic government of Muhammad Mursi in 2013.
• Erdogan also never misses the opportunity to lambast the Burmese government of Aung San Su kyi for its ethnic cleansing of Rohingya Muslims with Erdogan’s wife, Emine Erdogan, visiting the oppressed Muslims at least twice.

Some people have wondered, ‘Why have there not been people like Erdogan in other Muslim dominated countries? It is obvious; most of the ‘Islamic’ political groups across the Muslim world do not see welfare as being part of Shariah. A good example is Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim nation. 

As a country with Muslims at 88% and elections largely free and fair; devout Muslims have been unable to take hold of power. In 2014, a Christian became the governor of the country’s capital, Jakarta. 

On June 27th 2018, in a regional election in Bekasi, 68% of voters voted for the secularist candidate, Rahmat Effendi, over the candidate of the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI). The secularist got 68% of the votes.  

This was attribute to the Islamic parties not having a concrete manifesto and voters were like, ‘We are already Muslims, we need schools, hospitals and other social amenities to make our stay in this world comfortable before we meet ALLAH; not just Qur’an competitions’.

The same played out in Pakistan during the July 25th 2018 general elections. The MMA (Muttahida Majlis–e–Amal), the party that was viewed as the only ‘Islamic’ party contesting, failed woefully. Of the 342 seats available in the Pakistani parliament, the MMA won only 15 seats getting only 4.85% of the total votes counted.

It becomes very difficult to blame Muslim voters for voting secularists into power and this is the reason why most of the Muslim nations continue to be rule by atheists/secularists. 

Muslims must practice Islam fully, the complete practice of Islam led to the world’s first welfare state which was established by Muhammad (SAW) and promulgated by his companions.