“Early on the morning of March 19, dozens of armed police appeared at my door with a detention order. The scene looked like the arrest of a terrorist rather than the elected Mayor of Constantinople, its largest city Turkey“Written by Imamoglouin his article in the New York Times.
Ekrem Imamoglu describes his arrest just 4 days before the qualifying elections for the next presidential election in Turkey, as a dramatic but slightly unexpected move.
He stresses that his arrest came, after “months of escalating legal harassment against me, culminating in the abrupt recall of my university diploma 31 years after my graduation. Authorities seemed to believe that this would exclude me from the race because the Constitution requires the president to have a degree in higher education.
Realizing that he can’t beat me in the ballot box, Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan fled to other media: He put his main political opponent on charges of corruption, bribery, a criminal network and assistance to the illegal Labor Party of Kurdistan, although the accusations are deprived of reliable data. I was available available from my elected office because of the financial categories. “
“The Republic of fear under Mr. Erdogan”
“For years, Mr Erdogan’s regime has been dismissing democratic controls and balances – silenced the media, replaces the elected mayors with bureaucrats, sids the legislation, controls justice and manipulates the elections. Large -scale arrests of demonstrators and journalists in recent months have sent a creepy message: No one is safe. Votes can be canceled and freedoms to be removed at a time. Under Mr Erdogan, democracy has become a democracy of fear.
It is more than the slow erosion of democracy. It is the deliberate dissolution of the institutional foundations of our democracy. My detention marked a new phase in Turkey’s slip into authoritarianism and the use of arbitrary power. A country with a long democratic tradition is now facing the serious risk of crossing the point without returning.
The repression expanded beyond me. In a sweeping operation based on a indictment that is nothing more than a collection of deposits from secret witnesses, police arrested almost 100 people, including senior municipal executives and businessmen. Prior to the arrests, misinformation and defamation campaigns in pro -government media were preceded.
However, the people of Turkey responded with provocation. Despite the prohibition of demonstrations and barricades at the main entrances of cities, hundreds of thousands of citizens from Constantinople to the northeast city, traditional stronghold of Erdogan, took to the streets. Within a few hours and the following days since my reservation, people of all ages and backgrounds joined my party. Outside the headquarters of the Municipality of Constantinople, people made vigilance despite the ever tougher measures and arrests. “
’15 million people voted me’
“Even with repression, the Republican People’s Party successfully held its qualifiers last Sunday. The counting of the party showed that 15 million people, including 1.7 million registered party members, voted me as a candidate for the party’s president.
Since my election as mayor in 2019, I have faced nearly 100 investigations and twelve judicial cases. From the unlikely to the absurd, each category was part of a broader attempt to wear me, to prevent me from serving the people who elected me, to remove me from the office, and to eliminate me as Mr Erdogan’s opponent.
I have already confronted candidates supported by Mr Erdogan three times – twice in the local elections for Istanbul in 2019 and once again last year – when he personally campaigned against me. I won every time. Now that he can’t beat me in the elections, he is using his handle in the judiciary to stifle a contender who, according to recent polls, could win if the elections were held today.
So why did so many people come out on the streets in the biggest demonstrations from the demonstrations at Guez Park in 2013? “
‘Boils’ Turkey
‘In the midst of increasing injustice and a problematic economy, Public frustration in Turkey has reached a point of boiling. People speak and rally around me, a candidate who promises integration, justice and hope for a better future. They will not be silenced. The audience also recognized my arrest as an attempt to push Turkey even more on the path of authoritarianism.
Even in circumstances, the signs of solidarity withstand. Social Democratic leaders and mayors across Turkey and not only, from Amsterdam to Zagreb, showed their support, with courage and authorities, after my arrest. Civil society also did not swing. But the central governments around the world? Their silence is deafening. Washington has simply expressed “concerns about recent arrests and demonstrations” in Turkey. With a few exceptions, European leaders have failed to give a strong answer.
What is happening in Turkey and in many other parts of the world shows that democracy, the rule of law and the fundamental freedoms cannot survive silently, nor be sacrificed for the reasons of diplomatic ease disguised as “realpolitik”.
Undoubtedly, the recent events – Russia’s War in Ukraine, the overthrow of the al -Assad regime in our neighboring Syria and the destruction of Gaza – have enhanced Turkey’s strategic importance, not only because of its critical ability to contribute to European security. However, geopolitical should not blind us in front of the erosion of values, especially in human rights violations. Otherwise, we legitimize those who disperse the rules-based world-class class.
The survival of democracy in Turkey is vital Not only for its people but also for the future of democracy worldwide. The era of uncontrolled powerful demands from those who believe in democracy to be equally dynamic, dynamic and relentless with their opponents. The fate of democracy depends on the courage of students, workers, other citizens, trade unions and elected officials – those who refuse to remain silent when institutions collapse. I have faith in the people of Turkey and not only fighting for justice and democracy. “