The mountains and highlands are ours...

Last week, Mehmet Ali Avcı and later Yıldız Gökmen called me regarding the protest against "Mining Sites" to be held in the Nif (Arpacık) neighborhood of Fethiye. "An inspection is going to be carried out for a new mining exploration license in a wide area from Kırkmaar (Kırkpınar) to the Yayla Koru neighborhood. As villagers and environmentalists, we will meet the expert team. We would like to see you among us to protect our nature and our mountains."

Since my childhood, I grew up living with chrome mining and manganese mining between Fethiye and Köyceğiz. Just like in Elazığ, Erzincan, and between Balıkesir and Kütahya, our mines, which have increased and decreased over the years, have been dug up and exported as if by gold prospectors.

In our childhood, Göcek was a chrome ore export center. The bay, which is now full of yachts, was overflowing in those years with freighters, sometimes 7-8 of them carrying chrome daily. The chrome brought from the mountains was transported to the freighters by barges for days. I worked there for a short time, and I received my first social security number in those years.

In the 1945-1950 period, when World War II ended, the world's need for chrome increased, and attempts were made to extract ore from surface mines. Two mine workers lost their lives due to a mining accident in the Kanlı Ocak area of Göcek Village, an event that has been remembered for years as the "Two Alis" incident. Since the Soma disaster, many mine collapses and accidents have continued. Instead of enacting laws that prevent accidents, efforts are being made to enact laws that plunder nature. Aside from mining accidents, nature massacres are also increasing day by day. Issues such as mining sites, EIA (Environmental Impact Assessment), and the plunder of nature continue to occupy the public agenda. When will modern mining management come to our country?

On October 27, 2025, we, the villagers of Nif and the surrounding areas, gathered. We came together as citizens before the expert examination for the chrome screening facility project, which is intended to be built over a large area. Despite the decision that an EIA (Environmental Impact Assessment) is not required in the examination and evaluation conducted in October 2023, a new application was made, and the process was restarted. I believe that the mining and forest plunder law from the Turkish Grand National Assembly (TBMM) also has an effect on this.

We are against turning those beautiful highlands, where we have grazed our livestock and drank from their waters during the Göcek Gürsu Pırnaz highland migration, which has been inherited by our grandfathers and us for years, into molehills.

Zeynep Ebru Aksoy, the Fethiye District Representative of the Turkish Foundation for Combating Soil Erosion, for Reforestation and the Protection of Natural Habitats (TEMA), who spoke at the meeting, pointed out that the project, which includes the area from Nif Fountain to Karanfilli Highland and contains mining sites and waste areas at six different points, was stopped in 2023 as a result of a lawsuit. As a large community of villagers, nature lovers, and environmentalists, we protested once again with banners and slogans.

Nif Headman Ferhat Uysal and many NGO representatives explained that they are against the 6 chrome mines to be established in the region and the chrome screening and washing facility in Yeşil Üzümlü, and that the project should be reconsidered.

While the speeches and protests were continuing, the expert team passed by the people gathered at the Nif Fountain without greeting them and headed rapidly towards the Tuzla Pass.

Among the protest banners, the ones that stood out were: "Breath, Not Mining," "My grandmother and grandfather met at this fountain. Stay away from my water and nature," "Stop! The highland is ours, the water is ours. Do not touch my nature and my water!"

Meanwhile, the AKP's plan to open conservation forests to plunder has also emerged. With the regulation change, cyanide will be able to be used in forests. If the change prepared for the mining lobby is realized, the "protection status of conservation forests" will be lifted, following olive groves and national parks. Our forests, nature, and olive groves are being picked apart and will be plundered by mining licenses issued nationwide.

In these days when precious mineral mines are very much on the agenda in the world and especially in our country, I wanted to share with you the struggle to protect our nature in our region.