Republican People’s Party (CHP) chairman and opposition presidential candidate Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu met with People’s Democratic Party (HDP) Co-Chairs Pervin Buldan and Mithat Sancar at the Turkish Parliament in Ankara midday Monday (20 March). The meeting between the CHP head and the pro-Kurdish, left-leaning HDP had been rumored for weeks as Kılıçdaroğlu seeks to broaden his electoral appeal heading into Turkey’s presidential and parliamentary elections on May 14th. Support from the HDP and the Kurdish electorate is seen as critical to a potential Kılıçdaroğlu victory, without which the election would be likely to proceed to a second run-off round.
Following the one-hour meeting, the HDP Co-Chairs and Kılıçdaroğlu spoke at a press conference, in which the trio declared their shared support for key pieces of the HDP platform including solving the Kurdish issue through parliamentary means, strengthening Turkish democracy and judicial integrity, fighting violence against women in Turkey, expanding use of the Kurdish language, and ending the long-running closure case against the HDP.
Solving the Kurdish issue through Parliamentary means
In the press conference following the meeting, HDP Co-Chair Pervin Buldan articulated how she and the CHP Chairman shared the goal of solving Turkey’s long-running Kurdish issue through parliamentary means: “The reason we have invited Mr Kılıçdaroğlu for a visit today to show that we share a goal of finding a solution to the Kurdish issue within a parliamentary framework.” The “Kurdish issue,” as it is known in Turkish, refers to the long-standing civil rights struggle of Turkey’s sizable Kurdish minority, as well as related separatist militant activity that has occurred in Turkey through the years. Turkey’s predominantly Kurdish southeastern provinces have seen on-and-off clashes for decades between Turkish government forces and separatists, with the banned Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) being the most infamous militant group. Kılıçdaroğlu has long been vocal about solving the long-running Kurdish issue, and campaigned against the ongoing HDP closure suit. Although President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan had made efforts to address the Kurdish issue with the ‘Resolution Process’ starting in 2009, the long-tenured strongman has largely abandoned the initiative. Erdoğan and his coalition partners have even gone as far in recent years as to claim that Turkey no longer suffers from a ‘Kurdish issue’. Kılıçdaroğlu echoed Buldan’s statement on the issue at the press conference on Monday afternoon saying “The address to solve the Kurdish issue is the Turkish Grand National Assembly.”
Strengthening judicial and democratic integrity
Criticizing how Turkey’s judiciary has fallen under the influence of Erdoğan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) in recent years, Kılıçdaroğlu said “An independent and unbiased judiciary is a must. Our state must be a state of laws. A social state must be in charge of distributing earnings and fixing inequality.” Criticizing how Erdoğan’s government has deposed numerous democratically-elected HDP mayors in Turkey’s eastern cities and replaced them with government-appointed AKP trustees, Kılıçdaroğlu said “We have discussed how the appointment of government trustees was wrong…Those who come [into power] through elections leave through elections.This is the basic rule of democracy. The fact that the will of the people has been held hostage is objectionable. We must defend democracy in every setting and under all conditions. To defend democracy is to defend human rights.”
Fighting violence against women
In Monday’s press conference. Kılıçdaroğlu also made reference to fighting violence against women, a central HDP initiative. Turkey has made headlines in recent years for its epidemic of femicides, many of which go under-prosecuted, and Turkey’s departure from the Istanbul Convention for combating domestic violence in March 2021 was highly criticized domestically. Speaking about fighting violence against women in Turkey, Kılıçdaroğlu said “It is not right to encourage violence against women and to stay quiet on this issue. On this topic we must adopt a clear and unwavering stance.”
Kurdish language use
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Expanding use of the Kurdish language in Turkey has long been a goal of both the HDP and the other pro-Kurdish parties that have preceded it. The language was banned entirely following Turkey’s 1980 military coup, and educational instruction in Kurdish remains off-limits in both private and public schools. On the topic of expanding Kurdish-language use into the Turkish parliament, Kılıçdaroğlu said “English and French both appear in the Turkish parliament written in parentheses, but when a text appears in Kurdish it is referred to as an ‘unrecognized language’. For the love of god, how is it possible that we have Kurdish television channels in this country but it is still classified by our parliament as ‘unrecognized’? This language has been spoken for thousands of years and a double-standard in our parliament is unbecoming. We must respect everyone’s language…This is an imperial game where people are pitted against one another. We will break this game and make a country where everyone can be comfortable.”
HDP closure case
The HDP faces an ongoing closure case before Turkish courts over alleged terrorism connections. Regarding the potential closure of the party by the country’s supreme court, Kılıçdaroğlu commented saying “We must stop creating political problems and solve the problems we already have. In the 21st century it is wrong to try and close a political party. We have already seen how parties that are closed reappear on the political scene and receive public support.” The CHP Chairman’s comments referred to a long list of pro-Kurdish political parties in modern Turkish history who have been closed down by the government only to be reincarnated under different names or leaders.
Although previously scheduled for March 18, the Kılıçdaroğlu-HDP meeting was rescheduled for this Monday. The HDP had previously announced in January that they would run their own presidential candidate, but the recent rapprochement with Kılıçdaroğlu has had many guessing that the party may ultimately opt against it. Recent comments by Selahattin Demirtaş, the former HDP leader who has been imprisoned in Edirne since 2016, has made the notion of a separate HDP candidate seem even less likely. The imprisoned former party head has urged Turkey’s opposition to unite in defeating Erdoğan. HDP Co-Chair Mithat Sancar has said that an official announcement from the party on the matter will come within the next day or two.
Kılıçdaroğlu walks a delicate tight rope as he makes overtures to the HDP and Turkey’s Kurdish-minority electorate. Although this bloc is an important part of any hypothetical opposition victory, the CHP chairman risks alienating center-right and nationalist elements of his electoral alliance by getting too cosy with the HDP. Meral Akşener, a long-time nationalist politician and chairwoman of the center-right İYİ Party which represents the second largest party in Kılıçdaroğlu’s Table of Six alliance, has ruled out formally bringing the HDP into the coalition. In a TV interview after Kılıçdaroğlu’s candidacy was announced, Akşener was asked what Kılıçdaroğlu’s overtures towards the HDP meant for the Table of Six, to which she responded, “We have the obligation to treat other political parties in Turkey with respect and he has every right to meet with them [the HDP]. But no, the CHP cannot bring the HDP into our table [Table of Six alliance].”
