Which Road?

Ismet Inonu, 75, can claim to be the founder of two-party democracy in Turkey. In 1950, as Turkey's Dictator-President, he staged the first fair elections--and lost. Ever since, as leader of the opposition Republicans, the grizzled war hero has been struggling to keep the republic on the trail he blazed.

But it is increasingly apparent that Inonu's way is not the way of Premier Adnan Menderes, who deplores criticism and resents opposition. In recent months, under a repressive press law pushed through by his ruling Democrats, Menderes' government has jailed at least five newsmen, including the country's leading editor. When Inonu set out early this month for party meetings at the Anatolian cities of Kayseri and Yesilhisar, the government ordered army units to block his way. Last week Menderes' government proposed a parliamentary inquiry into the Republican Party's "subversive, illegitimate and illegal activities." The bill listed "charges" that the party was stirring up rebellion among the people, trying to involve the army in politics.

The National Assembly session was stormy. A Republican, shouting that he had seen a Democrat draw a pistol, tlouted the deputy over the head with a briefcase; he was expelled for six sessions. Protesting that "you cannot be accuser, judge, and at the same time executioner," Inonu denounced the bill as "an illegal rape of the constitution and human rights." "Listen to me," he told the Democrats. "If you continue on this road, even I cannot save you." Then he walked out in protest. "We will try even you, Pasha," jeered a Democrat.

The 15-man parliamentary commission, all Democrats, began its work by banning all political activity for three months and suspending four newspapers for reporting details of the Assembly session. This was intended, said a spokesman, to have "a calming effect." But as old Ismet Inonu left the Anatolia Club that afternoon to walk 400 yards to Ankara's Ish Bank, a crowd of 5.000 formed quickly around him. They shouted "Hurriyet [Freedom]" and began singing the famed marching song that Turks sang at Samsun in 1919 when the late great Ataturk landed to launch the fight for an independent Turkish republic. But not for long. Truckloads of police rolled up and arrested 22 of the demonstrators.

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