DSIP
Elected mayors from HDP in Diyarbakir, Mardin, and Van have been removed from office
Appointing trustees to these three municipalities, in these days when Turkey and USA prepare together for a military operation to establish a “safe zone” in Syria, shows that the state does not have any intention of opening the door to an attempt at a solution or a process of dialogue.
The state is sending more than one message at the same time with its intervention by “trustees”.
The first message is that HDP has been called to account for its opposition to the AKP-MHP block [led by Erdogan] during the recent elections, instead of “staying neutral”.
Another message is that the attempt to establish a “safe zone” with the USA does not mean any dialogue, sympathy, and cooperation with PYD or other any Kurdish organization, and that the state does not renounce its strategy of seeing this as a question of survival.
Finally, by appointing trustees, they have made clear that no Kurdish advances will be allowed, neither in Syria nor in Turkey.
The treatment of the Kurdish question with policies based on conflict, prosecution, imprisonment and the appointment trustees must end.
The mayors who were elected (with 63% support in Diyarbakir, 56% in Mardin, and 53% in Van) just four months ago must be restored to their positions.
Democratic space in Turkey has been much reduced with the entry into force of the Presidential Government System; now the appointment of trustees usurps one of the people’s few fundamental democratic rights, the right to elect and be elected.
What workers and the poor in Turkey need is not the extortion of the people’s will with the policy of trustees, but to enhance and to respect democratic rights. The interference against these three municipalities in fact targets all municipalities and the right to vote. In short, it targets the last remaining pieces of democracy.
We, as the Revolutionary Socialist Workers’ Party, condemn this attack on democracy. We call on everyone to defend democratic rights.
Devrimci Sosyalist İşçi Partisi (Revolutionary Socialist Workers’ Party) is Marx21’s sister organization in Turkey
