Turkey’s Constitutional Court has struck down a legal barrier that prevented public employees who were dismissed under emergency decrees during the state of emergency declared after a 2016 coup attempt and later reinstated from seeking compensation for damages, Turkish Minute reported.
The decision could open the way for thousands who were wrongly removed from their jobs to claim redress.
The court’s ruling, published Monday in the Official Gazette, concerns the legal framework created under decree-laws, issued by the government during the two-year state of emergency declared after the July 15, 2016 coup attempt. Those decrees were used to summarily dismiss more than 125,000 civil servants, often without individual court rulings, on accusations of links to banned groups.
Under a 2018 law that incorporated and amended several decree-laws, dismissed employees who were later reinstated through a subsequent decree were explicitly barred from claiming compensation. Ankara’s 22nd Administrative Court challenged this provision while hearing a case brought by a reinstated worker seeking non-pecuniary damages.
The Constitutional Court found the clause unconstitutional, citing Article 40 of Turkey’s Constitution, which guarantees the right to seek remedies when rights and freedoms are violated. The court noted that reinstatement meant authorities themselves had determined there was no evidence of wrongdoing, effectively acknowledging the dismissal had been unlawful.
The decision recalls a previous ruling in which the court struck down a similar barrier for workers reinstated by a parliamentary commission rather than by decree. In both cases the court said the state must compensate for harm caused by wrongful actions of public officials, with the right to recover the amount from those responsible.
Although the state of emergency formally ended in July 2018, the dismissals and their legal consequences remain in force, and victims continue to seek reinstatement and redress. Monday’s judgment could affect ongoing and future lawsuits by individuals who regained their jobs but were denied the right to seek compensation under the now-annulled provision.
