The Turkish parliament on Tuesday, Febryary 27, rejected a censure motion against Civil Works and Housing Minister Koray Aydin for causing financial loss to the state in tenders for the construction of houses for earthquake victims.
Deputy parliament speaker Ali Iliksoy announced at the end of a hand-vote in the 550-seat parliament that the censure motion — pitched by the main opposition Islamic Virtue Party (FP) -- would not be put on the parliamentary agenda.
In their motion, the Virtue Party had accused Aydin, from the far-right wing of the ruling three-party coalition, of setting the state back by millions of dollars in tenders the ministry launched to build permanent houses in northwestern Turkey after a devastating August 1999 earthquake.
It further charged that the minister had favored municipalities controlled by his Nationalist Action Party (MHP) over others in decrees issued regarding disaster management in the region.
The 1999 tremor, measuring 7.4 on the open-ended Richter scale, killed nearly 20,000 people and left tens of thousands homeless in the densely populated area.
Tuesday's vote came as Turkey was battling to regain control of its economy after abandoning a key currency peg and floating the lira, which subsequently depreciated by 30.5 percent against the dollar.
The government announced the change in the monetary policy — central to an IMF-backed disinflation program — on Thursday to contain a liquidity squeeze triggered by fears of political instability.
The move has jeopardized Turkey's fragile efforts to cut chronic inflation to a single-digit number by the end of 2002 under the anti-inflation program, which is being revised in consultation with IMF officials. — (AFP, Ankara)
© Agence France Presse 2001
© 2001 Mena Report (www.menareport.com)
