The 1997 military memorandum refers to the decisions issued by the Turkish Military leadership on a National Security Council meeting at February 28, 1997 which initiated the February 28 process that precipated the resignation of prime minister Necmettin Erbakan of the Welfare Party and the end of his coalition government.[1] As the Erbakan government was forced out without dissolving the parliament or suspending the constitution,[2] the event has been labelled a "postmodern coup" by Salim Dervişoğlu.[1][3][4]
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The operation was planned by generals İsmail Hakkı Karadayı, Çevik Bir, Teoman Koman, Çetin Doğan, Necdet Timur, and Erol Özkasnak.[5]
On 17 January 1997, during a visit to the Turkish General Staff, Turkish president Süleyman Demirel requested a briefing on what had been bothering the military. İsmail Hakkı Karadayı, Chief of the General Staff, enumerated 55 items, labelled "reactionary". Demirel said half of them were based on hearsay. He encouraged Karadayı to communicate with the government, and to soften the memorandum's wording.[6] On 31 January 1997, anti-Israel protests took place in "Al-Quds night" that was arranged by the Sincan municapility in Ankara. The building in which the "Al-Quds night" took place was plastered with posters of Hamas and Hezbollah.[7] As part of the process, the tanks moved on the streets of Sincan on 4 February. The movement was later described as a balance adjustment to the democracy by Çevik Bir.
At the National Security Council (MGK) meeting on 28 February 1997, the generals submitted their views on issues regarding secularism and political Islam on Turkey to the government. The MGK made several decisions during this meeting and the Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan from the Welfare Party was forced to sign the decisions.[8] The decisions were intended to protect the secularist ideology in Turkey. Some of the decisions that Erbakan was forced to sign are:
After the process following military memorandum, Erbakan was forced to resign. Although DYP, RP and BBP declared that they should form the new government with the Prime ministership of Tansu Çiller, Demirel appointed ANAP leader Mesut Yılmaz to form the new government. He formed a new coalition government with Bülent Ecevit (DSP leader) and Hüsamettin Cindoruk (the founder and the leader of DTP, a party founded after February 28 Process by former DYP members) on 30 June 1997. The Welfare Party was closed by the Constitutional Court in 1998. Necmettin Erbakan was banned from politics for 5 years and former MP members and mayors of RP joined the Virtue Party. Istanbul mayor, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan from Virtue Party was given a prison sentence after he had read a nationalist and Islamist poet and he was banned from politics forever. In the 1999 general elections, The Virtue Party won many seats in the parliament but it was not as successful as the RP in the 1995 general elections. One of the MP members of the party was Merve Kavakçı who wore an Islamic headscarf. The Virtue Party was also closed by the Constitutional Court in 2001 because of Merve Kavakçı's entrance to the parliament. Although former Istanbul mayor Erdoğan was banned from politics, he managed to form the Justice and Development Party, a reformist party that declared not to be a political party with a religious axis. The traditional Islamists formed the Felicity Party.
While the move was ostensibly directed against Erbakan's Islamic party, some have speculated that the coup was actually directed against Erbakan's coalition partner, Tansu Çiller, who was implicated in the Susurluk scandal.[11]
It is alleged that Bülent Orakoğlu of the police intelligence, under Hanefi Avcı, learned about the coup plans.[12]
Çevik Bir, one of the generals who planned the process said that “In Turkey we have a marriage of Islam and democracy. (…) The child of this marriage is secularism. Now this child gets sick from time to time. The Turkish Armed Forces is the doctor which saves the child. Depending on how sick the kid is, we administer the necessary medicine to make sure the child recuperates”.[13]
Necmettin Erbakan said that the process had been planned by the Zionists.[14]
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