Turkey’s Finance Minister Speaks of Unorthodox Posture in the Eye of the Hurricane

When Turkey’s new finance minister, Nureddin Nebati, was asked last month about details of an effort to stem the lira’s collapse, he found a new way to explain his strategy.

“I’m not going to give you a number right now,” he told a surprised television interviewer. “Can you look into my eyes? What do you see? The economy is the twinkle in the eye.”

For a man chosen by the country’s president, Tayyip Erdogan, who will oversee and articulate his unorthodox economic policy of cutting interest rates amid spiraling inflation as the local currency tumbles, the response was unconventional.

After six weeks in the top job in Erdogan’s cabinet, combining the finance and treasury portfolios, the 58-year-old left markets baffled with comments on issues ranging from the inflation outlook to the Federal Reserve.

“We left the orthodox policies aside, now it’s the heterodox policies,” Nebati told businesspeople two weeks ago, referring to interest rate cuts, which run counter to mainstream economic theory that fighting inflation requires higher borrowing rates, not lower.

“We will not follow a path laid out for us by others, but our own path,” he said in one of the many speeches and television interviews he has given since taking office.

Critics of the government, including opposition politicians and foreign economists, say that path is dangerous for Turkey, and that Erdogan has further unbalanced markets by appointing Nebati.

“Instead of instilling confidence in the economy, you took steps that petrified everyone,” said IYI nationalist party leader Meral Aksener, addressing Erdogan. “As our nation takes its toll, the ‘Comet Nebati’ you brought to the helm of the economy… blatantly speaks of the ‘glow in your eye’.”

Even some sources close to the government expressed concern, saying Turkey could have chosen a figure closer to the financial market to manage the economy at such a turbulent time.

Nebati has made several startling statements since his appointment, erroneously saying that the Fed, the US central bank, is owned by five families. He also said Turkey has entered a “positive vicious circle”.

Asked about a major rally in the lira after Erdogan announced last month that deposits could be protected from currency fluctuations, Nebati insisted that state institutions had no role in the local currency’s rise, although official data points to significant interventions in December.

Nebati could not be reached for comment, and a finance ministry spokesperson did not respond to questions about the minister’s role. Erdogan’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.