#turkish protest

last Wednesday, the President of Turkey detained his most powerful rival and the Mayor of Istanbul, Ekrem İmamoğlu, along with more than 100 others including mayors of prominent Istanbul districts (who are all members of opposition parties). İmamoğlu was detained on the basis of corruption and aiding terrorist organizations; however, his interrogation questions reveal that the charges are entirely based on hearsay. nevertheless, he was arrested yesterday based on the corruption charges, and sent to the same prison where another opposition leader and many opposing journalists are also being held. to add insult to injury, just the day before his detainment, İmamoğlu’s university diploma was unlawfully revoked. a university degree is required to become president here, so this was clearly done to bar him from running for president. ironically, our current president famously didn’t go to university (although he claims that he did).

İmamoğlu and the other mayors’ arrests are the culmination of 23 years of our president’s regime. he rules with fear and violence. if you speak against him in any way, you lose your job and, in many cases, go to prison. that’s how he has silenced our nation for more than 2 decades. he has built himself an empire off the back of our people and continues to milk us for everything we have. he owns all branches of the government, all the ministries, the military, the police. EVERYTHING. his policies have destroyed our education system, there’s no justice anymore (unless it’s against the opposition), at least one woman gets murdered every single day, people aren’t safe even inside their homes, you can’t find a job unless you know the right people, there are almost no governmental checks on important industries due to corruption (ie. food regulation, construction, etc.), and last but certainly not least, the sky-high inflation has lead to millions of people living below the starvation threshold. i mean, just look at how much our currency has been devalued over the years.

people are suffering. they’re committing suicide because they can’t afford to live or provide for their families. and it’s only going to get worse. İmamoğlu’s arrest alone has devalued our currency by 10% in a single day.

as if all these weren’t enough, two consecutive earthquakes in 2023 caused the death of an estimated 100-200 THOUSAND people and injured thousands more. we have been paying the government a special tax specifically for disaster situations like this since 2002 — and yet, when the time came, the government STILL failed to rescue, help, or protect the survivors. they literally sold blood and tents to the survivors... AND instead of delivering the goods that millions of citizens gathered to send to the survivors, some municipalities of the ruling party stored them for themselves and gave them out as “gifts” to potential voters when the elections came around.

moreover, last month 79 people burned to death in a luxury ski resort, and all the government did was blame the firefighters and detain the mayor of the city (a popular opposition party member).

not a single government official resigned after either of these disasters.

there are so many other examples of the president and his cronies’ depravity, but if i were to list them all, we’d be here all year. i hope you can understand why we, the people, are frustrated with them. we have been crushed under his thumb for decades.

we are fed up. we are angry.

so it was no surprise that the public reacted against İmamoğlu’s detainment. what no one expected, however, was how MASSIVE the backlash would be. the last mass protest we had was 12 years ago, and the protesters involved with it are STILL being prosecuted. now, it’s said that over a million people are out on the streets every day, and the numbers keep rising. yesterday, all while İmamoğlu was being arrested, the main opposition party held a vote to officially pick him as their presidential candidate, and they invited the public to vote symbolically to show support. over 15 million people showed up to cast their votes for him (around 61 million people in total can vote in a real election, and remember, many people didn’t/couldn’t vote due to fear of repercussions). this arrest has brought every opposition party and organization together and had them rally against the government. and i do mean EVERY opposition party. right, left, religious, secular… ALL of them. university students who were murdering each other 40 years ago due to their right-left clashes are now running to each other’s rescue and holding hands. that should give you an idea of how huge of a deal this is.

this is the president’s worst nightmare — us coming together and no longer fearing him. because he knows that if we remember our strength as the people and keep up the fight, he doesn’t stand a chance against us.

here are a few photos from the protests:

peaceful protests are our constitutional right, but before we even heard of İmamoğlu’s detainment or had the chance to protest, the president released his army of riot police on us with their batons, tear gas, rubber bullets, and armored cars. he declared that all large gatherings were prohibited for 4 days (which he later extended to 8), slowed down the internet so we couldn’t use Twitter or Instagram or Whatsapp to communicate, censored news channels and threatened to end any channel that broadcasted live footage of the police brutality against the protesters, called the protesters “street terrorists” and “vandals”, detained more than 1100 protesters (some of whom i personally know), and continues to detain protesters from their homes using facial recognition. the detained protesters are kept from speaking to their lawyers for as long as possible (thus extending their detention), and many more are being injured out on the streets (some permanently). it’s only a matter of time until someone gets killed.

the average citizen doesn’t own guns here. the only people that do are the armed forces and gang members. and yet, we’re still fighting back against the police who fire rubber bullets, tear gas, and freezing pressurized water at us, and beat us up. we’ve already caused some minor changes with these protests, but they’re not nearly enough. tonight, the opposition leader has called for a nationwide boycott targeting every company close to the government (he even gave specific brand names, another first in Turkish political history).

as a nation, we’ll have to endure a lot of physical, mental, and economic hardship to get rid of our dictator. but it’ll be worth it in the end. it has to. we’re at the end of the road here. one more step forward, and we’ll turn into Russia. we can’t let that happen. this is a fight for life or death now, and we have almost nothing left to lose.

if you’re looking for ways to help us, the most effective thing you can do is to stop buying anything imported from Turkey and, if you can, cancel any upcoming trips here until the president steps down. domestic and international economic pressure is our greatest weapon against the government.

this fight will seriously hurt the country as a whole, but us Turks are used to adversity. we will fight until the last man if we must. democracy will prevail.