Constitutional Court may annul referendum says Abdullah Gül's former adviser Ahmet Takan

Yeniçağ newspaper’s Ankara representative and Abdullah Gül’s former adviser, Ahmet Takan, has claimed in his column appearing today that the Constitutional Court may annul the constitutional amendment referendum held on 16 April.

The relevant portion of Takan’s article follows:

“Talk has been reaching my ear for some time. I need to get solid confirmation to pass it on to you as news. It has made its way into the social media to a degree. Talk in Ankara lobbies of the Constitutional Court annulling the referendum. Whenever I speak to an AKP member of parliament and whenever I meet with a palace adviser, they always speak of the dissatisfaction they feel with the referendum results. They say, ‘Despite what is thought, it did us no good.’ I have received confirmation from multiple sources that there are preparations at the palace for the annulment of the referendum.

If you say, ‘What kind of preparation?’ it is impossible for me to put it in writing! There have been individual applications to the Constitutional Court for annulment of the 16 April referendum. The maker of one of these is CHP Trabzon MP Haluk Pekşen. Pekşen went to the Constitutional Court on the grounds, ‘Over the referendum process, the right to vote and freedom of speech were violated in a blatant manner and with decisions that were egregiously unlawful.’ I asked Haluk Pekşen and he said the no reply from the court had yet been forthcoming to him and “from the latest information I have obtained it was in waiting.’ The question begs itself - a good six months have passed since the referendum.

What could possibly be the reason for waiting?

You have to think. If the talk in the lobbies turns out to be true and the Constitutional Court annuls the referendum where will this all lead? If it issues an annulment, where will the articles in justification hold sway? Will the referendum results be void in their entirety? Will this set the scene for a return to the parliamentary system? Could there be developments that pave the way for a single-round presidential election in place of a two-round election or for the president to be elected in parliament once more? Will R. Erdoğan be able to court the sympathy vote again? Could this be accompanied by attacks that will thwart new moves in domestic politics? The political rumours that reach our ears for sure also reach all the more loudly the ears of the learned presiding judge and learned members of the Constitutional Court. I think there is an immediate need for them to make a pronouncement that will put this debate to rest!”