The Yeni Şafak headline reads wrap-ups as “Interest rates up, currency up, inflation went wild”, “Rational collapse in economy”, and “Production down, industry stopped”. A pro-government paper’s slamming of the Turkish economy is considered an anti-Şimşek operation within the ruling AKP.
The front page of the Yeni Şafak newspaper on May 26 surprised those who saw it and was widely discussed in political and economic circles.
The headline of Yeni Şafak (New Dawn in Turkish), one of the staunchest supporters of President Tayyip Erdoğan and the AKP government, read in large letters, “Interest rates up, foreign exchange up, inflation got wild”. The other headlines covering the top half of the page were “Production down, industry at a standstill” and “Company bankruptcies multiplied”, news that could have been subject to investigation if written by an opposition newspaper.
What was going on?
One of the current scenarios that came to mind was that after the opposition CHP’s Ekrem İmamoğlu won the mayoralty of İstanbul in 2019 and 2023, and the Albayrak Group, which owns Yeni Şafak, was awarded the city’s transportation tenders. Was the headline a preemptive strike against the possibility of a punishing investigation against the Albayrak Group, because of continuing to work with a CHP municipality after having benefited from the former AKP mayorship for years?
Soon it was clear that the strongest scenario was another one, and that Mehmet Şimşek, the Minister of Treasury and Finance, was the target.
A Yeni Şafak operation?
The clue to this claim was also on the first page of Yeni Şafak newspaper.
A wrap-up article titled “Rational collapse in the economy” is next to the headline.
That the economy would move to a more “rational” ground was the phrase Şimşek used when he took over from Nurettin Nebati after the 2023 elections.
Nebati was the one who continued the “Let’s lower interest rates and inflation will fall” policy of Erdoğan’s son-in-law Berat Albayrak, whom the President appointed as the Treasury and Finance Minister after merging two ministries after the 2018 elections.
CHP leader Özgür Özel pointed directly to the address: “Yeni Şafak hit Şimşek with wood,” he said, asking those who want to see “intra-party turmoil” to look there, implying media reports about intra-party turmoil within CHP.
Mediatic AKP voice Şamil Tayyar said that everyone on the street was saying that the economy was not doing well, supporting the newspaper headline.
In fact, local and foreign economic circles were talking about the fact that what Şimşek had tried to do in 18 months with the Medium-Term Economic Program was gone in 18 minutes, referring to the collapse in the İstanbul Stock Exchange on the morning of March 19, when İmamoğlu was detained, hours before the CHP called the masses to Saraçhane where the municipality headquarters is, to resist.
Both Şimşek and Erdoğan claimed that it showed the success of their economic program that they could extinguish the fire by spending some USD 60 billion from public reserves.
18 months gone in 18 minutes
On the other hand, just a few days ago, AKP Deputy Chairman Nihat Zeybekçi, who is in charge of the economy, admitted that the recent turmoil in the economy was caused by March 19. A few days before that, Zeybekçi had said there could be no investment in production until interest rates dropped below 30 percent. The political interest rate of the Central Bank is 46 percent now.
Although Zeybekçi’s March 19 statement indicated that the ‘18 months gone in 18 minutes’ complaints were more because of political than economic reasons, the interest rate statement was addressed to the Ministry of Treasury and Finance and the Central Bank (CBRT) under Fatih Karahan.
Yeni Şafak was not targeting Şimşek alone, but the Central Bank Governor, with whom it aligned Şimşek.
Karahan became CBRT Governor after Hafize Gaye Erkan’s sensational 9-month adventure as the governor of the Central Bank. Then it was rumored that he wanted to be Türkiye’s ambassador to the OECD, a rumor that hit the wall of Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan.
Now her name has been put back into circulation due to his subordinate-superior relationship with the new US Ambassador Tom Barrack at the bankrupt First Republic Bank.
Just when there are rumors that Erdoğan could change some ministers in June.
Berat Albayrak, Gaye Erkan?
As a reminder: The Albayrak Group, which also owns the Yeni Şafak newspaper, and Berat Albayrak, President Erdoğan’s son-in-law, are not related; they coincidentally share the same surname. But they are on the same political line.
Berat Albayrak was a practitioner of the “interest is the cause, inflation is the effect” approach that Erdoğan once espoused, based on the prohibition of interest gains in the Muslim holy book Kuran. Albayrak claimed that by intervening in the Central Bank and keeping interest rates low, both inflation and the exchange rate would fall.
It didn’t. That’s why, even before the 2023 elections, Erdoğan persuaded Şimşek, whom he had removed from the ministry in 2018 (with accusations of British connections), and replaced him with Nebati from Albayrak’s team.
Under these circumstances, it is natural to interpret the Yeni Şafak headline as an operation to undermine Şimşek. It was almost an announcement that the scapegoat had been found.
In a way, the fact that names such as Berat Albayrak and Gaye Erkan are being presented again as remedies is an admission that the negative impact of the economic course on AKP voters cannot be hidden anymore.
How long can geopolitical advantage work?
Erdoğan may be depending on the fate of Türkiye’s current geopolitical advantage and the economy, not on Şimşek’s program, but on the performance of Foreign Minister Fidan, National Defense Minister Yaşar Güler, and MIT Director İbrahim Kalın.
But the Yeni Şafak move is also a manifesto that the base does not want to wait that long.
The only person who will decide on the continuation of Şimşek and his program is President Erdoğan.
