Turkey condemned to learning the hard way

The international credit ratings agency Moody’s said in statement released on Aug. 15 that the election of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan as president “is unlikely to resolve Turkey’s key economic and institutional credit challenges because of ongoing domestic political tension and uncertainty that will prevail at least through the next parliamentary elections.”

Fitch, another key international ratings agency, came to a similar conclusion on Aug. 11. One does not have to be an economic expert or a political scientist, of course, to understand what these assessments are based on. Reading the papers in Turkey and following Turkish politics is enough for anyone to come to the same conclusions.

This is especially the case now that there are signs of unrest within the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) on the question of who will take over from Erdogan as prime minister. Reports that Erdoğan may bring one of his rabidly anti-Western advisors to a key position with regard to the economy is not enhancing Turkey’s image either.

Understandably, the government is angry at Moody’s and Fitch. The government’s ties with Standard & Poor’s, another ratings agency, also remain icy, even though it has fractionally increased its estimate for Turkey’s 2014 growth rate.

Erdoğan has made it amply clear in the past that he sees these agencies as lackeys of what he calls the “international interest rate lobby.” Economy Minister Nihat Zeybekci, a staunch Erdoğan loyalist, is sticking to this line also.

“You have to be blind and ignorant not to see the intention behind Fitch’s decision,” he said over Twitter after Fitch released its assessment...