Next flashpoint in Turkey: constitutional overhaul

By Emma Ross-Thomas - Analysis

ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkey's secular elite, stung by the election of an ex-Islamist president, faces a historic battle over AK Party government plans to jettison a military- inspired constitution and usher in radical reforms.

The secularists, including powerful generals, fear a new charter will erode separation of state and religion, muzzle the army and foment ethnic divisions, especially in the mainly Kurdish southeast. Some argue the very existence of the secular republic founded on the ruins of the Ottoman Empire is at stake.

The Islamist-rooted AK Party, which won a new five-year mandate in July polls, says the new "civilian constitution" will broaden personal freedoms and bring Turkey closer to the European Union it aspires to join.

The text will replace a much more authoritarian charter drafted after a 1980 military coup. The AK Party says it wants to build broad consensus for the changes through open debate.

But a constitution based more strongly on personal liberties, less on state interests, will test Turkish taboos.

Many Turks, for example, would view any easing of curbs on the Kurdish language as a threat to national unity. Lifting a ban on the Muslim headscarf in colleges would upset secularists.

"This is something Turkey and its people have not really experienced ... and without a tradition of consensus, I'm expecting a very tough debate," said columnist Yavuz Baydar.

"There'll be a lot of attempts to confront the AK Party ... as if they are questioning the main tenets of the republic."