Pointing out that the 99th anniversary of the Republic been and gone, pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) co-chair Pervin Buldan addressed the “renounced founding idea of the Republic on decentralisation and democracy” at her party’s group meeting on Tuesday.
Buldan’s speech was misquoted and went under heavy duress by by the government, the opposition parties and Turkish mainstream media.
The chair of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) Recep Tayyip Erdogan spoke about and elaborated on “Century of Turkey Vision”, a set of goals for his party’s election manifesto that explains the main objectives for the country in 2023, the year which will mark the Turkish Republic’s centennial.
In response to Erdogan’s speech on Saturday, Buldan said at her party’s group meeting on Tuesday, “We are talking about a centennial destruction process after the founding idea of decentralisation and democracy was renonced, and the system of homogenisation based on the rejection and denial of all diversities, particulary Kurds and Alevites, was established.”
Buldan, also called for “an end to the isolation” of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Öcalan in İmralı prison. She mentioned “thousands of people who were unlawfully arrested” in Turkey, as Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced a new vision for the country, dubbed to be inclusive.
After Buldan’s speech were misquoted in the Turkish mainstream media as, “The Republic is a project of destruction,” HDP’s spokesperson Ebru Günay released a written statement explaining that Buldan’s speech had been distorted.
Günay said, “Arguing that the HDP, which has waged a great struggle for the democratisation of the Republic and paid a price for it, has an issue with the idea and model of the Republic, is completely is completely a fool’s errand.”
Günay also stated that, “HDP will continue to defend the idea that the Republic to be empowered with democracy, justice and peace, and will continue to struggle for this aim.”
