Again, what is it about?
It is customary in democracies that a person, a group of people may
demonstrate against a project that they do not agree or have another opinion on
the matter. This time, the demonstrators are simply university students who do
not agree the road project that will pass through their campus. It is just this
simple.
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| Daily Life of a METU Student |
What do the authorities do?
Unfortunately, it is something that people have gotten inured to; ‘police
violence’ and state-backed brutality.
During the Gezi Park protests, Ethem Sarısülük, who was unarmed (and
legally cannot be intervened by deadly force and globally cannot be considered
as an act off self-defence), was shot in the head by a policeman in the central
square Kızılay of the capital Ankara.1
Yesterday, 26.10.2013, a student was ambushed by the police forces(?) in
the campus forest (which is the result of a hard work of a long course of
time), got beaten up, thrown into the FIRE! There are second degree burns in the victim’s abdominals and knees, and his head was cracked open (Please, see the picture below).This also has to be documented
that during the countless police interventions and tear gas firing, random bush
fires occur in the campus forests. And in Turkey, police forces cannot (or
should not in this case) intervene in the campus areas unless they were invited
by the campus administration. This is not a university bylaw, it exist in the
common laws.
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| The Student After the Police Intervention |
What hurts the public conscious is that whoever did this will not receive
legal punishment. The questions: ‘How can anyone be sure about this? Don’t you
need more proof in order to say this?’ can
be answer by extrapolating from what happened in Ethem’s case; the lawyer of
the defendant policeman is now a candidate from the ruling party,
AKP.2 It is a justification for what happened and only endorses the
police brutality. But also it should not be forgotten that PM Erdogan himself gave
a speech during the Gezi Park Protest stating ‘They ask that who gave the order
to clear(?) Taksim Square? I did!’3
What might happen in the near future?
The people of Turkey have shown the sensitivity to the abuse of their
children once. If this happens once again, one might expect mass demonstrations
across country. The other scenario is the AKP had managed the previous crisis successfully
and oppressed/scared the free-thinking average Turkish person so that they will
not present any problems by not agreeing with the every decision this
administration takes. All of us are yet to see which one of these possible future
predictions will come true.
- http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/prosecutor-fatal-shooting-of-gezi-protester-was-an-act-of-self-defense.aspx?pageID=238&nid=49394
- http://haber.sol.org.tr/devlet-ve-siyaset/ethemi-vuran-polisin-avukati-akpden-aday-haberi-81613
- http://www.radikal.com.tr/politika/erdogan_polise_talimati_ben_verdim-1138805
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