A new era in the PKK issue?

This can be attributed to the desire of the people to embrace greater change and the Justice and Development Party (AK Party)’s eagerness to respond to this desire of change in the last decade. But it should be noted that the AK Party has sometimes remained reluctant and undecided. There have been some understandable reasons for this, but in some cases this party has just acted selfishly. The AK Party has relied on strong public support and it has made serious progress by making the right decisions. But the opposition has also played an unconstructive role in this. They tried to undermine the process initiated by the government to fulfill the demands of Kurdish citizens. It was also a fact that the tutelage regime was preparing to stage a coup against the AK Party. When these plots were staged and dissolution cases were filed, everybody sympathized with the difficulties the party was experiencing and because of this, the people lent greater support to the AK Party.

I said at the beginning that Turkey is a country of surprises, the reason being a process of hope has started at a time of a deadlock in the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) issue. Interesting developments have taken place. Above all, the pro-statist Republican People’s Party (CHP) has abandoned its destructive style and adopted a new discourse of solution. A substantial portion of Turks still do not have confidence in this statist party which has worked to undermine the reform process in the last decade due to its alignment with the tutelage regime. However, regardless of the reason, we need to focus on what is measurable and what is visible rather than what we don’t know. The CHP leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu offered to hold a meeting with Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to resolve the PKK issue and to recognize the rights of Kurdish citizens, which kickstarted a constructive process. The CHP has moved from destructive opposition to a position that promises contributing to a resolution of the issue. It could even be said that the language of Kılıçdaroğlu was more constructive than the discourse of the prime minister.

Subsequently, Leyla Zana, one of the most renowned names in the Kurdish political movement, made several statements that represented the common sense of the people. She criticized the government, but unlike many Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) members, she did not ignore the positive steps taken towards finding a solution to the PKK problem. She stated that Erdoğan was powerful and decisive enough to resolve this issue. She also strongly criticized her own party, the BDP, and the PKK, stressing that the language that they used and their mindset were wrong.

According to Zana, the PKK had abandoned the idea of having an independent Kurdish state in 1999 and there was therefore, no reason to carry out a violent struggle since then. The PKK should have acted more carefully; young PKK members died in vain. In addition, the BDP deputies should have represented the common sense of the people. Zana upholds that the BDP deputies were emotionally detached from Kurdish people.

Interestingly, Zana’s calls were welcomed by the government and the general public whereas the BDP reacted strongly. However, after a while, they had to pull back. Longstanding and intricate issues create their own status quo. Some people acquire prestige and power out of this; they preserve their own positions by manipulating the rage surrounding of the problem without doing anything. In the aftermath, these big powers remain as large obstacles during the solution process of the problem.

But more importantly, most people experience a crisis of confidence in times of change. We have experienced this in the early stages of a resolution to the Kurdish issue. We were caught unprepared for peace. In fact, the material conditions for peace were present but we were not psychologically prepared for this.

I hope that the past few years have not been in vain, that the parties were sincere in their stances and have realized that truth is all that matters. Everybody is upset by the pointless deaths of young people because it became evident that war is pointless. Are we ready for peace? I would say, based on recent developments, that our minds are set to embrace peace more constructively than in the past.

But, like I said, Turkey is a country of surprises. Let us hope that the surprises will all be positive.