Erdoğan's 'crazy' canal

Thursday, April 28, 2011
SEMİH İDİZ

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan finally announced his “crazy project” on Wednesday. For weeks he has been “teasing” the public by saying, in effect, “we have a project that will blow everyone’s mind.” Well it is indeed a “crazy” project he has unveiled. He plans to join the Black and Marmara Seas with a 45-kilometer canal, which will amount to a new Bosphorus west of the existing one.

Erdoğan did not mention it of course, but the fact is, this project is not his or the Justice and Development Party, or AKP’s, brainchild. Not only has it been discussed since the early years of the Ottoman Empire, but it was also proposed in 1994 by the late Bülent Ecevit, a former prime minister and founder and head of the Democratic Left Party, or DSP.

It would have been proper for Erdoğan to pay tribute to Ecevit, but given Turkey’s current vitriolic political environment, this would also have been “magnanimity beyond the call of political expediency,” at a time when the general elections are so close. AKP supporters are now saying even if it was Ecevit’s idea; it is Erdoğan who will realize it.

Critics point out that the AKP mayor of Ankara could not even complete the metro line that will connect the center of the city with the new suburbs that emerged in the Eskişehir highway direction. They said the AKP’s minister for transportation had to take this project away from the Ankara mayor to expedite its completion, but has done little yet.

This may be splitting hairs, but it is a fact that Erdoğan’s “crazy project,” as he himself dubbed it using the term “crazy” in a positive sense of course, does in fact have to be seen to take off first before any hope can be invested in its completion. And even that may not be enough since Turkey is full of half-finished projects.

None of this should lead anyone to think Turkey can not undertake such a massive project, which it is said will outdo the Panama Canal. The same skepticism was expressed at the time when the Southeastern Anatolian Project, known as GAP and involving a network of massive dams, was initially announced.

Turkish contractors, engineers and architects also proved their mettle in Russia, Central Asia, the Middle East and North Africa. Erdoğan’s “crazy project” is therefore “feasible” as far as Turkish engineering and building capacity is concerned.

There also appears to be valid arguments about increasing shipping safety in the congested Bosphorus, one of the busiest waterways in the world running through the middle of a major city, by channeling shipping, especially oil tankers, through the new canal, which has been given the name “Kanal Istanbul.”

This, they argue, with reason, will reduce the risk of a major disaster in metropolitan Istanbul, which has already seen major tanker accidents and explosions in the past. The biggest and most dangerous one was the Independenta accident in 1979 when the Bosphorus was much less congested than it is today.

There is also the argument that a new waterway will also serve the whole Balkan region, and all the countries with a Black Sea coast, thus increasing Istanbul’s importance in international trade. Neither can the fact that this project will generate fresh money and jobs be overlooked it is said.

Politically speaking, on the other hand, the new canal will also be free of any encumbrances that the Bosphorus is subject to due to the Montreux Treaty. This will after all be a Turkish project, executed by Turks and owned and run by Turkey. There is also the promise of a new satellite city that will emerge as a result of this project, reducing, it is said, the demographic pressures on metropolitan Istanbul.

All of this, when put together, indeed makes the project sound feasible. But whether it is also “reasonable” at this point in time is another matter. Already there are well known architects, engineers and social scientist who say the whole thing sounds nice to the ear, but there are major environmental, climactic, demographic and social implications which should not be whitewashed.

They indicate that because of these implications such a massive project should be debated democratically by the public first before any final commitment is made. The major critics of the project appear, therefore, to have equally valid points. Turkey may be the 16th largest economy in the world, and it is more than conceivable it will be within the first 10 economies by 2050, if not sooner.

The fact is, however, there are major issues of social inequality and regional disparity that have to be address urgently. When looked at Turkey from the perspective of per capita income it certainly does no justice to the fact that it is the 16th largest economy in the world.

Southeast Anatolia is a case in point, being a region that requires massive investments in order to catch up with the Western Anatolia. Neither does this mean there are no poverty stricken regions in Western or Central Anatolia. Istanbul being a microcosm of Turkey, the same disparities can be seen within that city alone.

In addition to this Istanbul, one of the largest cities in the world in terms of population is also a city facing the threat of a major earthquake. Scientists tell us it is imminent that an earthquake will hit the city, even if the time cannot be predicted.

Given the shabby quality of much of the buildings of “old Istanbul,” which represents large swathes of the city, and the equally shabby construction practices in large parts of new Istanbul, it is clear the city needs major rehabilitation and reinforcement projects to increase public security.

It is being said Erdoğan’s “crazy project” will cost at least $10 billion to build, and probably much more than that. It will also use up major resources given the AKP plans for the project to be completed by 2023, the centenary of the Turkish Republic. This race against time will be politicized in Turkey so there is the risk that other major public works will be neglected in order to finish “Canal Istanbul.”

At the end of the day it is all in the “eye of the beholder” whether this canal project is a good or a bad one. There are arguments both ways. There are also those who remind us of Roosevelt’s “New Deal” that involved such massive projects helped the country out of recession. Turkey is not in recession but it does have mass unemployment. Therefore this project can help alleviate this.

But there are other massive projects in the area of housing, healthcare, better education, reforming the agriculture sector, modernizing Turkey’s army, mainly by moving to a professional army, rather than a conscript one, that perhaps need much more urgent attention.

Looked from this perspective, Republican People’s Party, or CHP, leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu seems to be speaking the truth when he says this massive project of Erdoğan’s, similar to all his other projects, has a missing link, namely the “human component.”

It is also a fact, however, Erdoğan has dazzled many with his “crazy project,” but whether he will benefit from this in term of the elections to the extent he wants, and whether he can even start the project remains very much to be seen.

Source: Hurriyet.
Link: http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/n.php?n=erdogan8217s-8216mad-project8217-2011-04-28.