AKP picks economist as its poster boy

By Vincent Boland

Published: July 3 2007 03:00 | Last updated: July 3 2007 03:00

Shortly after he was nominated by Turkey's outgoing government to be a high-profile candidate in this month's general election, Mehmet Simsek made an acceptance speech to ruling party worthies. It did not go down well.

"I said all these stupid things about the economy and I even used the phrase 'total factor productivity'," the former Merrill Lynch economist says, shuddering at the recollection. After the event, Abdullah Gul, foreign minister in the outgoing Justice and Development party (AKP) government, took him aside and whispered: "Mehmet, we're going to have to teach you some politics."

Mr Simsek is a fast learner. One scorching day in the town of Islahiye, in the southern province of Gaziantep where he is standing, he gave a fluent rendition of his campaign speech to several hundred AKP supporters, mostly farmers and small-town traders. He was given a rousing ovation.

He spoke articulately and even passionately about the economic record of the government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, which has its roots in political Islam. He urged his audience not to believe the lavish and, he argued, unfunded campaign promises of the opposition. There was the slight awkwardness of the novice politician, and a certain anxiousness not to encourage the cheering. But there was no reference to total factor productivity.

Mr Simsek is the first to admit that he is not a natural politician, or even a fully paid-up adherent of everything the socially conservative AKP stands for. He has spent the past few years in London, and his wife is American. Yet he has become the poster boy for the party's claim to have moved to the political centre ground.

In a bid to distance itself from its Islamist roots, the AKP has purged around 150 of its most reactionary outgoing MPs from its list of candidates and replaced them with smart young professionals. Alongside Mr Simsek, this new group includes people from the financial services sector and business, as well as professional women. It also includes internally versed analysts such as Suat Kimiklioglu, who until recently headed the German Marshall Fund's Turkey office.

Their inclusion is all part of an AKP strategy to shift its electoral appeal towards the secular centre-right ahead of the July 22 election.

"I'm not a normal politician," says Mr Simsek. But the opportunity to run, after he was sounded out by Mr Erdogan, was too good to pass up. His own belief in the need for radical economic reform and conviction that only the AKP could deliver this outweighed any other doubts he might have had about the party. "I genuinely believe the party has the most progressive platform, and I believe in its liberal economic policies," he says.

What really intrigued the Islahiye audience, however, was his personal story. Mr Simsek, who is 40, is originally from Batman, a city not far from Turkey's border with Iraq. The youngest of nine children of illiterate Kurdish parents, he grew up in extreme poverty in a house without water or electricity, and he did not learn to speak Turkish until he was six. Intelligence and ambition gained him a solid early education, and he went on to study at Ankara and Exeter universities.

Much has been made about Mr Simsek's earning power while at Merrill Lynch, where he was a leading figure in the City of London's emerging markets research and commentary community. "When did I earn all this money?" he remarks on the way to Islahiye, referring to enormous sums quoted in the press.

If anything, though, it adds to his local-boy-made-good image among the party faithful.

Mr Simsek is convinced that a majority of voters appreciate the economic turnaround in Turkey in the past five years and that the government will be returned with another commanding majority. As the leading AKP candidate in Gaziantep, he is certain to be elected. The question then becomes what he does after that. It is difficult to imagine such a restless imagination surviving for very long as a backbench MP, though he is reluctant to elaborate on what the deal with Mr Erdogan is.

Taking a break from campaigning in Islahiye to down yet another glass of tea, Mr Simsek seems to be growing into the role of politician. The main thing that animates him appears to be a desire for Turkey to do well and to be a role model for a younger generation of high achievers. "If this country is going to succeed," he says, "we are going to need a lot more role models."

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007