Our Ownerless Republic

When his 10-month prison sentence was upheld in 1998, he had said the following:

“The institutions of our Republic, the apple of our eye, whose 75th anniversary we celebrate with great joy, should not have been worn down so mercilessly. This country should not have welcomed the 75th anniversary of the Republic with these meaningless bans, pressures, and efforts to raise a uniform type of person.”

He also noted this:

“While world societies are entering the 2000s and looking for ways to be more in harmony with a changing world, they want to drag our country behind even the banana republics.”

Where are we in the 100th year of our Republic, the apple of our eye?

We have settled into the bottom ranks of world indices in law and freedoms...

Democracy has been reduced to the ballot box...

The nation has been divided into camps and turned against one another...

We have no reputation left in the eyes of the world...

While we were one of the 7 countries that were self-sufficient in agriculture, the youth to whom our Ata entrusted the Republic have been left homeless, landless, hopeless, and pushed into the arms of religious sects. Our children, our future, have started going to school hungry...

Yes, they sold and squandered the assets of the Republic. We were left with nothing. They are practically realizing Lord Curzon's dream.

What was that dream?

It was what he said to İsmet İnönü, who resisted at Lausanne:

“We have been negotiating for months. We are not getting any of what we desire. You are not giving. You are not showing understanding. We are not pleased with you. But whatever you refuse, we put in our pockets. We are saving them in our pockets. Your country is in ruins. Tomorrow you will come; you will ask for help to repair these, to develop. Then, I will take each of these things I have put in my pocket and give them to you one by one.”

That is exactly what is happening.

Imperialists and some artificial states that are their pawns are putting lists in front of us in exchange for three or five dollars; they are entering our lands, our ports. It is not enough; they are transforming our identity, our population!..

Speaking of Lausanne; July 24 was the 100th anniversary of this treaty, which is our country's title deed.

Gaza or whatever was not being bombed; but they did not celebrate that 100th anniversary either, they brushed it off.

Now we are sad and angry because they did not welcome and celebrate the 100th anniversary of our Republic in a manner befitting its glory.

No, my brother, the greater fault is ours!..

What hasn't happened so far; to which one did we show a proper reaction, did we stand up?!

If we had stood up, would it be like this, could the audacity have reached this point?

In fact, they explained clearly 20 years ago what would happen to our Republic and our nation.

There is one of these accounts that I can never forget.

Turgut Özal's brother, Korkut Özal, whom Erdoğan also saw as an "elder brother" and who was one of the pioneers of the "Sect-Trade-Politics" mentality, spoke to Neşe Düzel from Radikal on September 8, 2003, just 10 months after the AKP came to power, about how the AKP would change the state structure, saying, "Turkey is already addressing its issues with the 'principle of gradualism'."

Upon Neşe Düzel's question, “I didn't understand, how is it addressing them?” he made this analogy word for word:

“Engineers have drawing boards larger than a square meter. An engineer made a bet with his friend, saying, 'I will eat this drawing board.' His friend said, 'You can't eat it.' The engineer divided the board into 360 pieces. Every day, he crumbled and swallowed one piece. At the end of a year, he had eaten the entire drawing board. If you cannot solve an issue all at once, you address that issue decisively, step by step, and eventually, you solve the issue. This is the principle of gradualism.”

Yes;

Sometimes by assuming the "co-presidency of the Greater Middle East Project (BOP),"

Sometimes by calling it "reform-opening,"

Sometimes by wearing a "priest's robe,"

Sometimes by setting traps for the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) under the name of "ending tutelage,"

Sometimes by "trampling all kinds of nationalism underfoot," sometimes by appearing "local and national,"

Sometimes by aiming to "raise a vengeful and religious generation,"

The Republic of Turkey has also been divided into 360 pieces in 21 years, and the fate of the great country and nation has been surrendered to the two lips of one person.

Well, my brother, what did we do while these were happening?

We either played the three monkeys...

We either valued the future of ourselves, our children, or our spouses more than our country and our nation...

Or we surrendered to the fear spread by power and retreated to our corners...

Let no one deceive themselves with messages, clips, and Atatürk posters crammed into the last three days, thinking, "I did my duty."

I ask everyone, from the intellectual to the politician; who did what to protect Turkey and the Republic, what prices did they pay?!

Didn't the master of masters, İlber Ortaylı, say recently, "Let no one be offended, the Turks did not show respect to their Republic, they did not protect it."?

We had believed the Republic to be the "protector of the unprotected."

21 years later, we saw that the Republic has been left unprotected.

The day is now the day to be the protector of the Republic, and therefore to protect the homeland and the nation.

But not in words, in essence!..

Müyesser YILDIZ

October 27, 2023