What if the President did not have an academic degree?

Selahattin Demirtas, the jailed former co-chair of the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) wrote from prison what could happen if it was found out that the academic degree of the President is fake.

In his article titled "The Academic Degree of the President," Demirtas, a lawyer by profession, speculated on the grave possibilities that are likely to befall both the political administration and the president himself in case it was proved that the president did not actually have an academic degree, thus lacked one of the conditions for being elected.

Demirtas carefully noted that he was talking about the case of the President of Madagascar. "Do not confuse it with something else," he said, and added, "I have no intention of being jailed."

Making it clear that the article is not about the Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who according to widely circulating public rumors does not have a proper academic degree, Demirtas said:

"What happens within the state administration if it turns up that the academic degree is fake?

Let me right down some of the possibilities, and you go ahead with the rest.

As the ministers appointed by him will be rendered unauthorized, all decisions taken by these ministers will be declared null and void.

All ambassadors appointed by him will lose their positions.

All members of the Constitutional Court and the High Council of Judges and Prosecutors, who were appointed by him, will lose their positions.

All province and district governors and university rectors appointed by him will lose their positions.

All general directors and deputy ministers will lose their positions.

In brief, all past appointments will be declared null and void, leading to the instant collapse of the state bureaucracy, with all embassies and foreign representations rendered without authority.

All international conventions ratified by him will be declared null and void.

All laws passed in the parliament and which took effect after being approved by him will be declared null and void.

The Istanbul Convention will automatically come into effect (It was signed during his term as prime minister)

All lawsuits on charge of insulting the president will be dismissed, with earlier convictions in these cases rendered null and void. Compensations will be paid to those who were convicted in such cases.

All government contracts awarded to the Gang of Five instantly become inoperative.

Well, what will the President himself be faced with?

Since he will no longer be under the protection of presidential immunity, he will now face trial in an ordinary heavy penal court instead of the Constitutional Court. And there is no more a prerequisite of a voting in the Turkish Grand Assembly that requires at least 400 deputies' votes for impeachment.

All salaries paid to him, all extra payments, Palace expenses (food and drink, heating and cooling, communications, etc.), all expenses related to his private planes, all the salaries paid to his hordes of security details, all expenses under the secret fund, will be refunded from him to the last penny."

About Demirtas

Selahattin Demirtaş has been jailed since 3 November 2016, when he was arrested in a police raid in his house after his parliamentary immunity had been lifted with the votes of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP). He is kept in prison despite a binding ruling by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in December 2020 that he must be immediately released.