The
elections in Turkey are over and enough independent candidates forwarded by the
pro-Kurdish DTP party have been chosen to form a coalition in the Turkish
parliament under the party’s banner. Not only is it the second time in the
history of the Turkish republic that the Kurds will be represented in
parliament, but to my knowledge it is the first time that a pro-Kurdish party
could play a major role in the Turkish political system.
Sixteen
years ago it was for the first time that a pro-Kurdish party gained seats in the
Turkish parliament. We can all remember very well how in 1991 Leyla Zana did her
oath in Kurdish in Ankara, and consequently ended years in prison. But how
realistic were the Kurds taken back then? Major changes in recent years in
Turkey regarding the Kurdish issue, secularism and the European Union have
changed public opinion drastically.
Although
the Kurds can be happy with the results, the 24 seats out of the 550 are quite
low if one considers that the Kurdish population is about a quarter of the total
population of Turkey. This can be explained by several factors, whereby I
personally keep the negligence of the Kurdish issue by the former Turkish
governments particularly responsible for this. Turkish governments have kept
Northern Kurdistan relatively neglected for decennia. The rate of unemployment
is high, illiteracy and poverty are high. By keeping it that way, Turkey ‘feeds’
the PKK as mainly the younger generation will bend towards extremism because of
low expectations of life. But however, the parties that make up the Turkish
government will in that way assure the Kurdish vote. The part of the Kurdish
issue Turkey is afraid of, is the creation of an independent Kurdish state and
hence division of Turkey. By keeping the poverty at a high level the Turkish
government assures itself that the Kurds would have no means to maintain an own
state and that the Kurds will want to put their personal lives higher up on the
agenda rather than the strife towards an independent state. Short speaking, the
Turkish government would prefer the Kurds to pick up their weapons rather than
to pursue politics, because it knows that the former option would pose no real
threat for the unity of the republic. ‘Why should a Kurd with a low personal
position in society would want to bother himself with the creation of an
independent state which would exist of neglected land?’ That is de ideology that
Turkish governments have had and also the first factor that gives a clearer view
of the election results in Northern Kurdistan.
The fact
that never before a Kurdish political party had been able to get things done in
Turkish parliament is the preface to the second factor that explains the high
score of the AKP in Northern Kurdistan. As a consequence of this, one has
shifted gradually from a preference for Kurdism (Kurdayeti) over to a preference
for religion (Islam). Many Kurds see the DTP party as a regional one, whereas
the AKP got many things achieved in the past five years, mainly economically. If
the DTP wants to win the full support from the Kurdish people it has to make
effort to really get things done in parliament.
A third
factor lies more systematically. An example of this is by having just presented
four independent candidates in Diyarbakir (Amed), the DTP has ‘lost’ a seat.
Because an independent candidate just needs a certain amount of votes to be
chosen, it does in fact not matter how much votes above the minimum the
candidate has received. The four Kurdish independents in Amed were chosen with
each an overwhelming amount of votes, far above the minimum amount required,
which technically spoken means that a lot of votes have been neglected and did
not count. By having forwarded a fifth independent candidate, the DTP could have
used the extra amount of votes from the other candidates to get the fifth one
through to parliament. This has very likely been the case in other places as
well and hence the reason that opponents such as the AKP have scored relatively
high in the area. Looking to it from a bright perspective, in this way the DTP
has made absolutely sure that at least 20 of its independent candidates would be
chosen to get into parliament and this is what actually mattered.
More
indirect factors like illiteracy, but particularly assimilation have played a
role in explaining the results of the elections from the perspective of the DTP
independents. However at last, the DTP has made it to Turkish parliament by a
clever move. The people have given them the first push upwards and it is now up
to the party itself and its chosen members to achieve far greater results.
