Baykal: The government thinks it can do anything

Speaking to journalists after his daily sports, he accused the government of trying to create another crisis by submitting a proposal for the imam-hatip high-schools. He said Turkey did not need such problems, noting that education should be kept out of politics.

He said if the government’s aim was to improve the opportunities for the vocational school graduates, the government would have to try to make it easier for them to enter relevant tertiary courses.

He claimed everyone was talking about vocational schools, but in reality, the government had a hidden agenda. The government thought it could use its parliamentary majority to do anything it wanted, said Baykal.

He said he was discussing the issue with academics and rectors, noting that they were of the opinion of uniting in the face of this grave mistake.

He said some new EU members plus Greece were not allowing Turkish trucks to enter their countries, because of an insurance document that crosses out Greek Cyprus. He said this problem would be solved through a change in the document, but noted that this once again proved the fallacy of the government’s efforts on Cyprus.

The Greek Cyprus’s recognition issue was clouding the more important matter of the official recognition of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, said Baykal, adding that in order for Greek Cyprus not to be rewarded for its intransigent behavior, the EU and the U.S. had to take concrete steps.