Pertev steps down as Talat adviser

RASIT Pertev has resigned as Turkish Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat’s chief political adviser, saying he is giving up his top post in order to form a new political party with “a truly reformist agenda”.

Widely seen as a moderate, Pertev handed his resignation to Talat on Sunday night, telling his ex boss, he felt it was time for him to go it alone in Turkish Cypriot politics.

“At first he [Talat] did not want to believe it. He was surprised,” Pertev told the Mail yesterday, but added: “We have got on well for the last four years, and he respected my decision.”

His resignation followed days of press speculation that the ex-World Bank employee was indeed seeking to form a new political entity and would therefore be forced to give up his post in the Turkish Cypriot administration.

As chief advisor to Talat, Pertev often led negotiations with the Greek Cypriot side under UN auspices. Pertev says he will now concentrate on putting together a team that, if one day elected, would seek to “fight corruption, bring about accountability and introduce non-partisan governance”.

“Unfortunately, these concepts do not exist here in northern Cyprus,” he said, adding that his aim was to reform northern Cyprus “from top to bottom”.

Openly critcising current and past administrations in the north, Pertev added that ‘governments’ had failed to provide what he termed “good governance” because they promised certain individuals “gains and protections” which made them “unable to implement policies for the broader good”.

He then took a further swipe by saying, “If you’ve never seen a reform in your life, how are you going to implement one?”

On how his party would approach the Cyprus problem, Pertev said he believed there was currently “convergence” in Turkish Cypriot thinking, and that rather than debating between models of federation, confederation and separate states, his party would seek “new paradigms” for the resolution of differences.

Asked who would be included in his team, Pertev said it would consist of a mixture of old and new faces.

“There is good in the old, and good in the new,” he said.

Commenting on the resignation, Talat’s spokesman Hasan Ercakica told the Mail he had not been aware of problems between Pertev and Talat, and added that “maybe he [Pertev] really believes he can form a political party and be successful politically”. So far, no successor has been named to take Pertev’s place.