As Turkey is heading for the elections on June 24, Turkish Lira is losing value every passing day. The devaluation is a terrible, a wretched development since it means the impoverishment of the people in the first place. Putting up a fight against the ambitions to inflict the cost of this miserable process upon toiling masses, the Communist Party of Turkey also feels the need of clarifying certain points on the situation of Turkish economy.
1. The devaluation of Turkish Lira is not the cause, but an effect of the dismal course of events in the economy.
2. Turkish economy has reached the end of the road in its “growth” policy based on “borrowed” funds, suppressing wages and looting public funds. The root cause of the problems in Turkish economy is nothing but capitalism itself.
3. Economic crises stem from the very nature of capitalism. As a capitalist country, Turkey cannot evade crises.
4. It is absurd to assume that the problems in Turkish economy are merely caused by Erdoğan’s stubbornness about interest rates. Turkish economy cannot have a sigh of relief simply by hiking up interest rates.
5. Demanding the autonomy of the Central Bank is a disgraceful attitude. The autonomy of the Central Bank implies nothing but asking for international markets to take full control of the national economy. Such a demand suits well only to collaborationists, the minions of the United States and the liberals.
6. In this respect, the real problem is not the dependence of the Central Bank on the political power, but the nature of the political power itself. Erdoğan is the representative of a government which was established to serve the interests of international monopolies, but today he is having difficulties in fulfilling the tasks entrusted on himself.
7. We should never allow ourselves to perceive the Turkish economy from the eyes of corporations or magnates. After all, what interests us is the condition of the working people. The people neither have to pay for the debts of companies that have enjoyed their windfall profits so far, nor for bad loans.
8. Turkey is heading towards the great collapse which is also being experienced in many other countries. Unless the people say “enough with this corrupt system” and rise up, unless they take action to overthrow the political power of the capitalists, unless they cry out that they will not pay for this crisis, the capitalists will turn it into yet another opportunity on their own behalf and the bread on the table will become even smaller for the toiling people.
9. Turkey cannot and should not be a country where domestic and foreign capital have a free hand. It is the immediate nationalization of banks and big companies that would ramp Turkish economy up eventually. The only prerequisite of this policy is to establish the revolutionary government of the toiling people.
10. In order to turn the tables on the actual perpetrators of this crisis, the capitalists, when they force us to swallow the bitter pill regardless of which establishment party becomes the ruling party on June 25, the voice of socialism must become stronger.
11. The current social order is driving Turkey towards a cliff. For this reason, This Social Order Must Change. Taking action for overthrowing this system is the only way out. As a step to be taken in this direction, the TKP calls upon the toiling people to support independent candidates who say This Social Order Must Change on June 24.
Communist Party of Turkey
Central Committee
23.5.2018