The clash between imam-hatips and normal schools

The ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) says: "We explained what we intended to do about the imam-hatips in my program released before the elections and in the statements we made after the election and now we are keeping our promise. Neither the university rectors, nor the military can make such decisions. They can announce their opinions, but we make the final decision."

This stance is the most important and open reflection of a continued policy.

Until now, all governments not only consulted Kemalist bodies on sensitive issues, they tried hard to formulate a decision together with these institutions. The military was asked what they thought, and the government tried to follow the accepted way as closely as it could.

However on this issue, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan continued to follow the stance he took for European Union reforms and Cyprus: "Final decision rests with me."

This stance heralds a new era. It is impossible to guess how this era will unfold or where it will lead Turkey to.

If this process is not controlled or people resort to unnecessary competition, it may lead to a point, which we will regret.

If it is read carefully, the statement issued by the Office of Chief of Staff had said that it kept silent on the issue of EU reforms, but when the issue was secularism, no one should expect it to continue to do so. In other words, the Office of Chief of Staff was drawing a line. The prime minister showed that he would not recognize this line.

Consequently, we are faced with a potential conflict.

If these expressions are controlled carefully and are directed for constructive purposes, they could lead to a brand new era for Turkey. It could lead to a sound balance of powers.

However, the short-term prerequisite for this eventuality is for the AK Party to make everybody believe that it will protect the secular-democratic republic. The latest spat has increased the doubts.

The other prerequisite needs a long-term adjustment. I am talking about an adjustment that has to be realized, if the people want to be freed from such tensions. If we don’t want Turkey to be suffocated between the world-view of the imam-hatips and the secularist understanding of normal high schools, and if we want to find common ground, we need to make some fine tuning in our education system.

Things can’t continue like this
Two conflicting view-points are constantly clashing.

One is the firm secularist attitude that starts in our military and normal state high-schools and covers the entire system and the other is the education given in imam-hatips.

The majority of the people are stuck in between.

It is becoming harder by the day to continue with our democratic system with these two radical attitudes. We definitely have to find middle ground. Compromise can only be reached if both sides remove the extremist aspects of the stance. We have to know that we cannot relax until we do that.

There are fundamentalist movements in Turkey. There are also those who want the country to be ruled in accordance with religious principles. However, these form a minority. It is time to moderate both sides. We cannot proceed anywhere with these clashes.

The expectations of the conservatives (not fundamentalists) have to be taken into consideration, while preserving the secular system. We have to force both sides to let go of their "It will be done my way" attitude.

The number of imam-hatip schools, the education they provide and their purpose should be discussed, while we think about a system without extremes, where conservative families agree to send their children to