24.05.2013 09:44
What you see when you look at the issue of equality and equal citizenship in Turkey is a total mess.
What you see when you look at the issue of equality and equal citizenship in Turkey is a total mess. People from different political stances give the impression that they are speaking on matters that are in stark contrast to each other when equality is concerned.
But when you delve deeper into the roots of this mess, you come across the type of people who perceive "others" as a threat, don't pay respect to people who are different and want to create a world in which everyone is like them. We just cannot manage to be equal citizens.
Have a look at the dialogue that has been heard in Turkey in 2013: A deputy from the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) said Kurds cannot be equal to Turks. Accusing this deputy of nurturing racist sentiments, our prime minister defined the nation as a set of "Muslim ethnicities." In a sense, he meant to say that one has to be a Muslim in order to be considered an equal. Thus, in one swift move, he excluded most Greeks and Armenians, Jews, Syriacs and Christians from the definition of citizenship. What the CHP deputy did was discriminate based on race, but the prime minister's remark was nothing but discrimination based on religion.
Moreover, we know from the debate on cemevis -- cultural and religious centers for Alevis -- that not all Muslims are equal citizens. The Ankara governor's office tried to shut down an association that was established for the purpose of building a cemevi. The governor's office justified its decision by arguing that a cemevi is not a place of worship. The government's move to allow "associations that are founded to construct worship places" had been a model developed to counter serious pressure from the European Union between 2004 and 2005. At that time, the EU had criticized Turkey for not permitting non-Muslims to establish a legal personality, i.e., associations, foundations or societies, and the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) found Turkey in violation of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). So the Turkish government decided to find a middle path. It did not grant official recognition to churches, but it told Christians to establish associations to build churches just as there are associations to build mosques and thus, many church-building associations were founded. Except for a few cases, none of them have been able open a legally recognized church in this time.
The move to close down the cemevi-building association in Ankara means the government is denying Alevis the middle-path solution it offered Christians. Thus, they tell Alevis, "You cannot establish cemevis and you cannot establish associations to build cemevis." If this decision by the governor's office evolves into a court decision, this may eventually lead to the closure of existing cemevis. In the final analysis, if they cannot establish an association to build a cemevi, they cannot open cemevis, either.
This is how the ruling party is performing as regards the freedom of religion, but what about the CHP, which petitioned the Constitutional Court, demanding that the ban on the headscarf not be abolished? Acting as passionately as the CHP in advocating this ban, some bar associations waged a heated campaign to not allow headscarved women to practice law in courts. But as the Council of State did not support their campaign, they have failed to create much trouble for headscarved lawyers for the time being. Certain segments in Turkish society fear the liberation of headscarved women.
In Turkey, we think that the freedoms of those who are not like us should be restricted so that we will feel we are free. Unfortunately, many of us are afraid of a country in which everyone can cherish their religion freely and express themselves without restriction. We cannot imagine a country in which every person is a citizen and every citizen is equal. When we say "all citizens are equal," we are urged to add in an Orwellian manner "but some citizens are more equal than others." It seems as though we can only feel free when others feel they are enslaved or of a second class. My two cents is that this is Turkey's number one problem.
ORHAN KEMAL CENGİZ (Cihan/Today's Zaman)