Ankara: Turkey has made changes to 74 articles in its constitution. With those changes, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has got sweeping new powers. As per the amendments, the president is now the head of state and head of government.
After the President Tayyip Erdogan won the last month’s presidential and parliamentary elections, Turkey on Wednesday issued a decree that transfers some powers to the president. Changes have been made to laws dating from 1924 to 2017. References to the prime minister have been removed and replaced them with “president.”
With the new changes the president can form and regulate ministries and remove civil servants without parliamentary approval, he can appoint four members of the Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSK), the parliament can appoint seven, he can draft the budget and decide on security policies, he can declare a state of emergency for up to six months without cabinet approval, he can dissolve parliament, but this would trigger early presidential elections.