Gaziantep -- day 2

Jun 06, 2015 22:47

We did, as planned, meet with the IHD (Turkish human rights NGO) and with KESK, an umbrella union including public sector workers, and in particular the egitim (educators') union. This explains why we were told we were meeting the "teachers' and public sector workers' union" -- the KESK is a confederation of unions, including those for educators (and all workers at public educational institutions, for example, university administrators); public sector workers (hospitals, civil service); transport workers; etc.

It has been a long day. And tomorrow I have to be up early because we are leaving at 7.30 for the HDP offices. The polls open at 8am.

Some things learned today:

Gaziantep has not seen the level of violence/harassment/intimidation against the HDP campaign that has been seen in some other cities. The worst they have experienced in terms of attacks has been stones thrown at their campaign bus, and bunting torn down.

The suspicion is that the attacks are mostly by AKP supporters, but blamed on the MHP. This is for two reasons. First, the AKP has traditionally depended on a conservative Kurdish vote, so they would not want to openly acknowledge antipathy towards the Kurdish party. Secondly, the MHP is an easy target to blame. They are hard-right, nationalist, Turkist, and hence virulently anti-Kurd (and not just anti-PKK). On one occasion, HDP members caught some people red-handed destroying some of their banners/bunting, took them into the office and asked who they were with; they said, MHP. They were given some tea and biscuits, told not to do it again, and let go. On investigation, they were affiliated to the AKP, not the MHP.

There has also been some low-level police harassment of students and activists, and this morning, 5 HDP members were arrested from their homes; only one charged with an offence.

The Gaziantep municipal administration (run by the AKP) has been bribing voters with, of all things, white goods -- washing machines, fridges. It's true Gaziantep is a manufacturing sector for this sort to thing, but it still seems rather random!

It is understood that people were bussed into the rally yesterday -- public sector employees. They were relieved of their IDs on arrival to be sure they stayed for the whole rally -- they got the IDs back at the end.

Erdogan is openly leading the AKP campaign. This in itself is a violation of the Turkish constitution, as the President is supposed to be impartial in party politics. This chimes: the first thing I saw on TV today was him and Ahmed Davutoglu having a joint interview. Nothing can be done about Erdogan's actions, however, as the President is immune from all prosecution save for treason (that good old 1980 military constitution again).

A new development this campaign is closer links between opposition parties, even those who are themselves ideological opponents. Members of the HDP and MHP have been able to visit each other's campaign offices, for instance.

The amount of national media given to each party has been starkly uneven. Erdogan alone has had 56 hours in the last month, the AKP 40, the CHP (?) 17, the HDP 3. The local media is not that great; they are basically commercial outfits.



The IHD was founded in 1986, after a military coup. Their main office is in Ankara. They do not accept funding from any other organisation, so their activities are entirely voluntary and funded by member subscription.

Again, they are most concerned about irregularities during the count, not during the poll. However, there are polling issues as well. Turkey is still a "semi-feudal" society. Rural, undereducated women tend to have their votes dictated to them by their menfolk; likewise leaders of powerful clans/extended families tend to influence the way everyone within them votes. There are also issues to do with harassment of LGBT individuals and access of the disabled to polling booths.

There have been mass arrests today, across Turkey, of HDP election monitors. This raises big concerns about irregularities at the polls -- why are they arresting election monitors?

There is an individual on social media who goes by the name (pseudonym) "Fuat Anvi," who seems to know things before they happen. No one knows who s/he is or what hir connections are, but, for example, he warned that the arrests would happen. He's been doing this for months.

There have also been problems at recent elections with inadvertently spoiled ballots on the part of people whose mother tongue is not Turkish, or who are not completely literate. It is expected there will be around 500 ballots spoiled by accident.

Our HDP contact, Serhat, here added: Things have improved though. In the 1990s, people were disappeared, their bodies would be found the next day. Now they are arrested. In all of the attacks on the HDP, six people have died. Then, it would have been 60. They couldn't publicise then -- now they can. Technology has changed everything; they can exchange information and react to developments instantly. Standing as a party instead of independents also means they can organise much better. Again, the problem still exists in the villages of women being told how to vote by their men-folk. In areas where the HDP is strong, they have made real inroads to this mentality, they have really put across that they are the party for women. But in more conservative areas, this mentality still prevails.

There may be fewer irregularities in this election than in previous ones, because all of the opposition parties are alert to the possibility. They will probably all watch out for each other, as well as for themselves. There is some limited cooperation between opposition parties on this.

Syrian refugees in this part of the world are incredibly vulnerable. Especially the women and children. The men work, or fight, and the women and children are out on the streets all day. In Kilis, near the border, many Turkish men are taking unofficial second wives from amongst young Syrian women.

Shopkeepers and workers in this area are very prejudiced against the Syrians. They will work for 20 lira a day where a Turkish worker would normally get 50 or 60. There is anger towards Erdogan about this. The AKP vote will fall. That section of the vote will go to MHP though. These are people who believe the Kurds' successful war in Kobane has contributed to the situation. They think if IS had won, the refugees wouldn't be here, they'd be dead, or ruled by ISIS. It's a misconception. Those refugees who fled from Kobane are mostly in Suruc, not here, and a lot of them have gone back. Most of the refugees here are from Arab areas. MHP literature describes the refugees as "kacnik," which literally means "fugitive" and has the implication of useless, good-for-nothing people who have fled and hid.

There was then a bit of a dispute among the people we were talking to, because they were asked if it is different in other areas. The man said, it is better in Mersin, it is by the sea, the women feel more comfortable there. The woman objected to this, she said, in the Black Sea region the HDP can't even campaign safely, it's not right to say it's automatically better by the sea.

They were asked, why is it difficult in Antep. They said, this used to be a left-wing city, the PKK was founded here, a lot of left-wing groups organised here. Then came the 1980 coup. They destroyed a lot of organisations and turned Antep into an industrial city. In 1984 especially, a lot of industrial plants were set up. It became a workers' city. The previous socialist ideology was replaced by a right-wing, nationalist, conservative ideology. Some people vote MHP because of this, but at the last election the vote was 61% AKP, 9% MHP. It won't be the same this time. More votes will go to the MHP, and the AKP will lose Kurdish votes. They won't get 61% this time.

I was curious about the Black Sea region, I said, why is it bad for the HDP, there are minorities there I thought -- Laz and Circassian.

The answer I was given was twofold. First, the same thing happened as in Antep -- it was broken down after the coup, industrialised, and also Turkified. But also, apparently a lot of young men from that region died in the Kurdish conflict. Seeing them come home in coffins hardened opinion against the Kurds. But a change came again with Gezi Park (this is a common refrain all over Turkey). The police brutality was such that people thought, if they treat protesters like this, imagine how they must have been treating the Kurds all these years. So there was more empathy.

The situation in the Black Sea is not impossible. The HDP is campaigning there to an extent, but there it is more about normalising the party's image -- convincing people they're not a "terrorist" party.



There is a ban on any public sector worker publicly discussing politics. For primary and secondary school teachers, this extends to even belonging to a political party, although university educators may. In universities, repression takes a different form. University rectors are installed by the government, so they will be chosen for their affiliation.

Turkish schoolchildren get no education about the electoral process, or about the workings of the Turkish government. They learn from their families.

Again, the Syrian refugee crisis has been hard on the public sector. Workers at hospitals, for example, are under much more pressure. Wages have fallen, house prices have spiralled -- both to rent and buy. The Syrian refugees do not attend Turkish public schools -- they have their own teachers, their own schools. There are schools in the refugee camps, but they are very basic. Syrians are establishing their own business on the black economy -- they don't have any option as the Turkish government won't recognise them as refugees but calls them "guests" -- in practice this means they have no legal status in Turkey and no way to legally earn a living. But it creates resentment. The capitalists are happy, they've got a cheap source of labour. Even where their trade with Syria has fallen because of the war, their profit margins are going up because of this. Also oil is coming into Antep from Syria. The rich are getting richer off the crisis but everyone else is suffering.

It's a serious situation. The official figure for refugees is 450,000 just in Gaziantep, but the union thinks there may be as many as 600 or 700,000. Barely any of the children go to school. They all work. The schools here are low down on the league table in Turkey anyway -- in this area the idea is not to give children a good education but to prepare them to be factory workers.

An innocent question about what developments have taken place since the Gezi Park protests led to huge controversy in the room. Basically, what I could make out was this.

The BDP, which was the Kurdish party at the time, did not officially get involved in the Gezi Park protests, although individual Kurds attended. This was two years ago; the peace process was going well, Erdogan seemed to be negotiating in good faith. They had a lot to lose in turning away from that. The hardest-line of the Gezi Park protesters said they should have done it nonetheless -- give all of that up, and join the movement. They didn't.

In addition, it was not an entirely safe place for Kurds. There was a young Kurdish activist, a BDP member, who joined the protests on their first day when they started in Gaziantep. He was knifed and died of his wounds on that first day. The CHP and MHP joined the protest, and they are hostile to the Kurds. It wasn't necessarily a safe space for them. In some cities, CHP and MHP protesters marched on and attacked BDP campaign offices.

Since then, the peace process stalled, Erdogan refused to recognise Kurdish representatives, there was no sign of a civilian constitution. The Kurds lost faith in him. His real authoritarian tendencies were exposed. That was even before ISIS.

Since then, the rise of ISIS and the battle for Kobane have taken place, and Erdogan showed his true colours. It is widely believed -- taken as fact -- by Kurds that he has been indirectly supporting ISIS because he wants the Syrian government to fall. He has also stated publicly that he considers the PKK to be equivalent to ISIS -- both terrorists.

The BDP has self-criticised for its lack of involvement in the protests. Now the HDP is the umbrella for the Kurdish groups, the public sector workers, the leftists, feminists, socialists, LGBT rights movement, disability rights movement. One man said, "The HDP is now the spirit of Gezi."

We had the rest of the day at leisure. By this time it was past 4pm. The union rep took us out for an extraordinarily large late lunch. I spent the rest of the afternoon and evening wandering at leisure with various colleagues around the old centre of Gaziantep -- the bazaars, basically. It's been quite lovely.

While we were having lunch a nearby mosque caught my eye, and I was told it used to be an Armenian church. The minarets and domes are new additions, although the towers to which the minarets have been added are original. We also saw an old synagogue, now a "cultural centre." All of the old town is in the shadow of the citadel -- "kale" -- which is quite impressive. I managed not to buy anything at the copper bazaar -- not a scarf, not jewellery, not some inlaid wood something, not spices, nor sweets, nor copper goods of any sort. We'll see if I crack before I leave. In fact, I bought nothing all day save for a nose ring (3 lira, so, say, £0.72), and dinner (18 lira, so, less than £5).

turkey, election monitoring

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