[RUDAW.NET] Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan... Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him...
announced his plans and actions to clean
...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire....
of all Gulenists
... the Turkish version of the Boogie Man, who set fire to the Turkish Reichsstag...
and their influence, adding that if the people decide to change the country’s political system to a presidential one, he is willing to do so.
"The government will take the necessary steps to completely clean up the army of the Gulen terrorist group that attempted to carry out the coup. We want to build an army that protects its people not kills them, and we will take necessary procedures to clean the army properly," said Erdogan in an interview with Al Jazeera on Saturday.
He announced that the process of cleaning up the army will be completed by August 31.
And in addition to removing all Gulen elements from the army, they will be eradicated from the education system as well.
"We need to build a state starting from scratch. We have to do vertical and horizontal cleaning in the meantime. And we will change the curriculum and teachers at the military schools in the interest of Turkey, and the schools and colleges will be open for all Turks," the president said.
"We won’t allow any putschists in state institutions and we will not tolerate them," Erdogan added. "There is no difference between terrorism and a coup."
He hailed the unity and strength of the nation in the wake of the attempted coup, declaring that at a rally on Sunday afternoon, "[W]e will be one country, one nation, one flag and one state."
The rally on Sunday brings together leaders of three of the four main political parties. The pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party has been excluded from the rally and meetings of the party leaders in which they have discussed constitutional reform.
Erdogan described the failed coup attempt as an earthquake and affirmed that his current job is to prevent any aftershocks. He commended the Turkish people who confronted the putschists on the streets, saying "The Turkish people are more powerful than a weapon and no one can conquer them."
He pointed out that Gulen’s ambitions go beyond Turkey’s borders, saying they want to expand their influence to countries in Africa but warned they should be treated as a terrorist group.
| The Daily Mail has photos from the Sunday rally, reporting more than one million attended in Istanbul. The Turkish Anadolu news agency claimed as many as five million were there. |