Threats, blackmail, pressure!

Exactly one year has passed.

On February 6, 2023, as the clock struck 04:17, an earthquake storm struck southeastern Turkey with devastating force. 

The entire country was deeply shaken.

Hatay, in particular, and 10 other provinces in the region experienced a massive catastrophe. Tens of thousands of our people lost their lives.

These were recorded as the largest earthquakes of the last century. The pain experienced is as fresh today as it was on the first day!

The political Islamist mentality that has governed Turkey for 22 years neither healed the wounds opened by the earthquake nor supported those who wanted to extend a helping hand.

People were left to their fate on the thin line between life and death. The picture in the earthquake zone continues to haunt the conscience.

With the situation as it is, he got up and went to Hatay three days ago for his party's local election candidate introduction meeting.

We already knew that for 22 years, with a self-serving policy, he has been thinking about “how I can convert” every disaster that befalls the country into votes.

Therefore, we were not expecting him to show empathy, to tell people they are not alone, to say a few sentences to share in the pain of the earthquake survivors, or to embrace the public without partisanship. 

But we did not think he could threaten the people of Hatay so openly.

He said; 

“If the central government and local government do not join hands, if they are not in solidarity, that city will not receive anything. Did it come to Hatay? Right now, Hatay has been left alone, left forlorn.”

This was blatant blackmail.

“If you do not vote for us, that is, the ruling power, we will not provide services to you. You will continue to live in such ruins.”

In other words, the person at the very top of the state could, without any hesitation, for the sake of a “vote,” threaten his own people—people who, moreover, lost their mothers, fathers, spouses, children, brothers, sisters, and relatives in the earthquake, who perhaps escaped death themselves, who have broken arms and legs, lost eyes, have not been able to soothe the pain of the disaster they lived through, and are trying to hold onto life in tents and containers.

Unfortunately, these sentences received applause instead of a reaction.

We shouldn't have been surprised, but like everyone whose moral compass points to basic human values, we were surprised, saddened, and angered once again.

For the past two days, comments have been made on news channels to the effect of “did he let it slip?”

Of course, he did not let it slip; he said it knowingly and willingly, emphasizing it. 

This message was not just for the people of Hatay.

It was said in Hatay, which was leveled by the earthquake, so that it would reach the whole of Turkey more powerfully.

He knew very well that these words would be amplified one way or another due to public sensitivity. And they were amplified.

Even if criticized on news channels that define themselves as opposition, it was calculated that the real message would reach the person on the street.

Let us underline with a thick pen that he has won all elections since 2002 more or less with this method.

He said the same sentences during the 2019 local election process. He used the term “lame duck” for Ekrem İmamoğlu.

He sees the local elections on March 31 as a critical threshold for the continuation of the one-man regime. 

Through the result that will emerge from here, he will not only consolidate his regime but perhaps also prepare a political ground for himself to rule for life.

He thinks he will succeed by threatening, blackmailing, and applying pressure.

And he is not entirely wrong. This dire situation is gradually becoming normalized for the citizen on the street. 

As long as my country's people, like Stalin's chicken, continue to hope for help in order to receive a few pennies of social assistance from the government that condemns them to poverty, deprivation, and almost hunger,

In order to get their children jobs through the influence of AKP provincial and district headquarters, or at least to make them specialized sergeants even if they cannot get into the guard staff,

In order to include their homes in the zoning amnesty or to give their shanty houses to a contractor and get a share of the rent from five or ten apartments, it would not be wrong to say that this method will yield results.

Unfortunately, a very significant portion of my country's people voluntarily bow to the government's threats and blackmail. 

Aside from the psychopathology of the matter, is it possible to break this mechanism of a government that has tied public service to a “vote” and forces the country's people into obedience? 

Will the people of my country show resistance to the government's threats, blackmail, and pressure, or can they?

Can they say enough is enough, or are they able to?

Maybe…

One needs to maintain hope, but let us put a period to our article by saying that this does not seem very easy in the short term.