A powerful deputy chairman of Turkey's ruling AK Party resigned on Friday, a party member said, after months of pressure from the opposition accusing him of corruption and undermining the secular state. Dengir Mir Mehmet Firat was replaced by former Interior Minister Abdulkadir Aksu, an AK Party source told Reuters. Turkish media had earlier said Firat was stripped of his post.
Firat had infuriated the secularist establishment for his vocal support of an AK Party attempt to lift a ban on Muslim headscarves at universities and for his comments on Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the revered founder of modern Turkey. Firat, a vocal politician known for his colourful suits, is the most senior member to leave the leadership of Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan's AK Party since the Islamist-rooted party won re-election in 2007.
He has recently been attacked by the main secularist opposition Republican People's Party on corruption allegations, which he has denied. Erdogan was already under intense pressure to sack some key figures of his cabinet and his AK Party after the country's Constitutional Court in July ruled against closing the ruling party for Islamist activities but fined it instead. Analysts have said some conservative ministers are likely to go in a widely expected cabinet reshuffle as Erdogan seeks to move the party towards the centre after the closure case, which deeply polarised the European Union candidate country.
Allegations of corruption, which the AK Party denies, have surfaced in recent months and are likely to become a new battle line between the government and the secularist opposition ahead of municipal elections in March.
Anatolian state news agency said Bulent Gedikli was appointed as another deputy chairman, responsible for economic affairs, in place of Saban Disli who resigned previously. Disli had also come under pressure to resign on corruption allegations, which he had denied. The pro-business AK Party first came to power in 2002 with a promise of clean politics and anti-graft steps after a series of corruption scandals involving ministers and senior politicians under previous governments.
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