In Balıkesir, President Erdoğan said; “The conversation is still around the Kurdish issue. What Kurdish issue are they talking about? There is no such thing anymore… In this country, every ethnic element has it’s own specific issues…. Our Gypsy brothers and sisters have problems, Turkish people have problems, Lazuri people have problems, Abkhasians have problems, Bosnians have problems. All of them have problems. However, it’s the governments’ and administrations’ duty to solve these problems. Are we doing this? Yes. What are you lacking?” and HDP’s reply arrived not so long after;
Selahattin Demirtaş said; “If there is no Kurdish issue, then why does the government take these steps, why do they conduct this process? These are all pre-election attractions.” Altan Tan said; “MHP’s vote rates are around 18 percent, they are not announcing this. They want to take their votes, that’s why they are using these types of nationalist expressions.”
We need to clarify two points. First, one is the Kurdish issue; and the second one is the Resolution Process….
I’m talking about the “Kurdish issue” for two reasons on my own behalf. The first one is within the context of the problems experienced by the greatest ethnic segment, after the Turks, whose ethnic identities and languages had been disregarded in our country not so long ago…. The second one is also within the context of the problems that had emerged due to the non-existence of a Kurdish state between the new states, which had been supported by the imperialists during their own creations nation-states era, in the Ottoman-remainder lands and due to Kurds having to live within four states….
This is why I’m talking about the “Kurdish issue”; as an enlightened person, I’m obliged to do so. Then, is the President of this country obliged to do so as well? No, no he is not…
The President and Prime Minister, as executives, are responsible for having all the citizens, ethnic segments in this country living under equal and free conditions. This responsibility designates their perspective. From that perspective they address the citizens and emphasize that they will not capitulate on equality. Without a doubt, in the times, when the “Kurdish reality” was being denied and the Kurdish language had been regarded as a non-existing language, the politicians could identify this situation as the “Kurdish issue” or promise to fix it. When they come into power, they can even put an effort into solving it. For example, Erdoğan, who stated that the problems of the Kurdish-rooted citizens are “his problem” in a TV program he attended in June 2009, states that they have given a special place in their program while they were establishing the party and speaks like, “You can either call this a “Kurdish problem” or “Kurdish issue” or “Southeastern issue”.
According to my fixations, the same Erdoğan, after his efforts in resolving the issues of the citizens, who are from Kurdish ethnicity, had stated, “For me, the Kurdish issue in this country had already come to an end. From now on, there are issues of my Kurdish brothers and sisters in this country, but no such thing as Kurdish issue”, for the first time in April 2011 during the Muş Rally, and he arrayed the following justifications;
“We want to soothe the hearts of the mothers from Muş. Our honesty at this point is already clear. For the last 8.5 years we had removed bans, which couldn’t even be talked about before us. What did you tell me when we came here to establish the party? “Just remove this state of emergency, that will be sufficient”? Didn’t we do it as soon as we came into power? You’ve told us; “Just get rid of this hammer power, that will be sufficient”. Didn’t we kick the hammer power out? Can you imagine? The Kurdish was banned on the televisions of this country. There were discussions on whether to air Kurdish publications for half an hour or not. Aren’t we making Kurdish broadcast through TRT Six 24 hours a day? Mothers were unable to speak Kurdish with their children in prisons. Didn’t we remove it? Speak my brothers and sisters, speak however you want to. Didn’t we do all this? You were banned from singing songs, ballads in Kurdish; now sing it. Kurdish language courses were prohibited. Now open your courses, they are already some. Now in our universities we have Kurdish departments. Go learn my brothers and sisters. We have no such worries, whoever trusts his/her thoughts won’t be scared from the freedom of thoughts, we had taken the road with this motto.”
It seems that, Erdoğan says “there is no Kurdish issue”, since he believes that he had done operations to remove the pressure over the Kurdish identity and Kurdish language, and he has the right to do so. There is nothing about the statements, that these are pre-election attractions, that can be taken seriously. Because, the “there is no Kurdish issue” word is being stated in the eve of Newroz, where maybe the disarmament announcement will be made.
The willpower, which declares that they’ve removed the pressure over the Kurdish identity and language, are doing everything they can to prevent “sanguis draconis” from being shed with the “Resolution Process”. If they were in the worry of acquiring votes, they wouldn’t have taken this risk.
After all, the fact that the resolution process is still continuing, it’s now a sufficient evidence to show the existence of the “Kurdish issue”. Resolution Process is the attempt to have the organization, which had been established 35 years ago with the justification of the denial of the Kurdish identity and the claim to solve this issue through armed violence. It’s to say that the country had reached a level where an opportunity is given to every kind of demand to be voiced within the democratic system.
If the ones, who confuse the Kurdish issue with the Resolution Process, can decide whether they want to live peacefully in a strong democracy….
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