Why Turkey is investigating contractors after the earthquake

Turkey is still in a state of emergency, as the earthquake killed at least 35,000. But the finger-pointing has begun.

The rush for punishment comes amid grief, but also growing anger and frustration over the Turkish government’s response to the earthquake. Many are focused on emergency response – waiting for aid and rescue teams – but also anger about pre-earthquake policies, about how poor building construction can cause damage from disasters.

Turkey’s Justice Ministry said this weekend that 134 people were being investigated for their role in building a building that collapsed during the quake – some of which were advertised as complying with building regulations. At least 10 people were arrested, and several others were banned from traveling abroad, according to the New York Times. Some of those arrested have tried to flee. Turkey’s Justice Ministry also said it was setting up an earthquake crime investigation bureau to investigate deaths and injuries. (Vox emailed the ministry for comment but has yet to receive a response.)

“We will follow this closely until the necessary judicial process is completed, especially for buildings that suffered heavy damage and buildings that caused deaths and injuries,” Vice President Fuat Oktay told reporters at a Saturday briefing.

This seems like an effort in responsibility, but it is far from a strong accounting of the failure of the Turkish earthquake.

Turkey is located along two main fault lines, and after the deadly earthquake of 1999, the country passed strict building codes, but they were not consistently enforced. And that goes beyond builders and contractors cutting corners or using inferior materials. There are also municipal and state inspectors and officials who issue permits otherwise, or who look the other way. There are those who lobby for (and politicians who support) amnesty laws for buildings, essentially overriding regulations in the name of fast construction and profit.

“Earthquakes are natural phenomena. Yes, they happen. But the consequences of earthquakes are quite, I would say, governmental and political and administrative,” said Hişyar Özsoy, vice-chairman of the People’s Democratic Party and an opposition member of parliament representing Diyarbakır, a city close to the earthquake’s destruction. .

All this happened under the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who, together with the Justice and Development Party (AKP), has been in power for two decades. Erdoğan made the construction boom the centerpiece of Turkey’s economic growth. At the same time, they have consolidated their power in institutions, the press, and the courts. This rapid economic growth, occurring alongside democratic erosion, created a layer of government corruption and mismanagement that allowed contractors to build the buildings they did.

“This is very much about the whole system that Erdoğan built – not only politics, but also the economics behind it,” said Sebnem Gumuscu, a professor of political science at Middlebury College who has studied democracy and authoritarianism in Turkey. “The whole system is built on a corrupt network, a network of cronies, and all levels: local level, national level, local branches of the party, local construction, developers – all this together.”

Responsibility after the earthquake – but for whom?

In 2019, on the campaign trail, Erdoğan mentioned his efforts to grant amnesty to builders. “We have solved the problem of 205,000 residents of Hatay with zoning peace,” he said, according to an NPR translation by Turkish news site Diken. This amnesty policy is a type of red tape cutting that allows buildings to be built and certified even if they don’t meet safety and code requirements. Developers have to pay fines, but that’s actually an exception to the rule.

The building amnesty was granted before Erdoğan, and also before the 1999 earthquake that caused Turkey to revise its safety and building standards to better withstand the next earthquake.

After the The latest amnesty law passed in 2018, tens of thousands of amnesties were granted, including in earthquake affected areas. Pelin Pınar Giritlioğlu, the Istanbul head of the Union of Turkish Chambers of Engineers and the Chamber of City Planners Architects, said last week that the number could be as high as 75,000 in the earthquake zone. (Vox has reached out to Giritlioğlu for comment and will update the comment if we hear back.)

Another amnesty law is awaiting approval in parliament before the earthquake, the BBC reports.

Amnesty is a window into the types of practices that enable the mismatch between existing regulations and codes and what is actually enforced – and what allows for that gap. to become widespread. Even such individual policies, such as amnesty, are difficult to separate from the broader dynamics of what is happening in the economy and politics.

As experts say, construction is an economic engine and therefore everything is possible.

This means all layers of the political and economic structure, from the lowest to the highest. Construction is also a source of political power for Erdoğan and the AKP, as large Turkish construction companies expand government contracts and support the regime. The construction boom, which affected other sectors of the economy, helped Erdoğan and the AKP to become popular; which then allowed him to bolster his own authority, and helped put the AKP into power at all levels of government, including state and municipal offices – often tasked with monitoring permits or implementing construction codes.

Politicians have an incentive to approve things like amnesty laws. People get rich through this ecosystem of cronyism, so there is no incentive to ensure earthquake-safe standards are applied. And the institutions that could hold these players and politicians accountable – the press, the civil service, the judiciary – are being gutted and undermined by Erdogan’s increasingly authoritarian bent.

So, yes, the developers and contractors must have been unwitting, building buildings with cheap materials or designs that could not withstand a 7.8 SR earthquake. But these shortcuts cannot happen without the involvement or encouragement of government institutions, all of which are aware of the country’s vulnerability and move forward.

“Surrounding the contractor is a deed to respond to public objections,” Taner Yuzgec, former president of the Chamber of Construction Engineers, told the New York Times. “The real culprits are the current government and previous governments that have maintained the system.”

The Ministry of Justice investigation is also has the potential to take the pressure off not only past misdeeds, but also criticism and complaints about the government’s response to the earthquake. Erdogan has centralized many of the institutions he controls, which means that many of the functions of the state are carried out. Experts and critics say which likely contributed to some delays in disaster response, including from the military.

This question about Turkey’s response – which is felt most by people who are waiting to find their loved ones or sleep in the cold – is now causing a lot of anger. Still, the investigation targeting the builder could ease the pressure on Erdoğan, his party, and those associated with his government. “He did a good job of reaching some simple targets, to show that he is serious. ‘I look after the interests of my people, and I will make these people responsible for whatever they do,'” Gumuscu said.

The question now is whether scapegoating a few low-level people will be enough, or if this could be the decisive factor in Erdoğan’s political destruction. Elections are scheduled for May, and the country’s economic crisis and Erdoğan’s power have long left him vulnerable, even with his deliberate democratic erosion.

Whether the earthquake will challenge Erdoğan’s power is an open question, but what happens after the earthquake will determine the future of Turkey. Millions of people were left homeless after thousands of buildings and apartments collapsed. Those houses need to be replaced. Turkey will rebuild. But how?