Support for İmamoğlu from DİSK Emekli-Sen: 'We will not retire from the struggle for democracy!'

Support for Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality (İBB) Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, who was detained at his home in a dawn raid as part of investigations launched against him, is growing like an avalanche. Support for İmamoğlu, who has been held in detention for hours along with many of his colleagues, has also come from members of DİSK Emekli-Sen. 

In a statement released by the DİSK Emekli-Sen administration, it was stated: "We will continue to resist against those who eye our bread and our livelihood until the tyrants are gone, until we build an equal, free, and democratic Turkey! We will not retire from the struggle for democracy!" 

The full statement is as follows: 

"We Stand with the Union of Municipalities of Türkiye and Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu: 

We Will Not Retire from the Struggle for Democracy, Rights, Law, and Justice!

The creators of the economic crisis our country is in are dragging society into poverty and misery every day. Millions, united in poverty and misery, continue to organize a strong social opposition. On the other hand, the government is trying to suppress all dissenting voices and obtain through trustee policies what it could not win at the ballot box. While democracy has been limited to going to the ballot box, trustee policies show that the ballot box itself has lost its meaning. The unlawful detentions and trials that ignore the will of millions point to a 'final bullet,' so to speak.

March 19, 2025, is the final point this entire process has reached. It is proof that democracy and the rule of law have been completely cast aside; that Türkiye has become a country of political and arbitrary decisions rather than legal ones. The only explanation for the cancellation of the diploma that Ekrem İmamoğlu, the mayor of Türkiye's largest city and a presidential candidate, earned 35 years ago, and the subsequent detention of himself, along with mayors, council members, journalists, artists, and dozens of citizens on fabricated grounds, is this: 

The Palace government has reduced the legislature to a decorative position, forced the judiciary to become the voice of its master, and collapsed the democratic social state of law. 

However, efforts to win through the judiciary what they could not overcome through elections are in vain. While the parliament's agenda should have been the retirees' holiday bonus, the retirees' agenda has once again become the struggle for democracy. Retirees will continue to insist, as they did yesterday, that in a country without democracy, bread, water, and life have no meaning. The struggle for democracy and rights is as vital as the struggle for bread, and as necessary as the struggle for bread. 

We are not watching; we are fighting:

As DİSK Emekli-Sen, the voice of retirees in Türkiye, we continue to fight for democracy, to illuminate the future, and to defend both the ballot boxes and the streets together with our grandchildren.

We declare: The detention of Ekrem İmamoğlu is the product of an indescribable fear! 

We declare: The millions who unite will defeat fear, darkness, and unlawful political interventions!

Keep your three-penny holiday bonuses! 

The streets, the squares, the ballot boxes, and the tomorrows will be ours! 

We will continue to resist against those who eye our bread and our livelihood until the tyrants are gone, until we build an equal, free, and democratic Turkey! 

We will not retire from the struggle for democracy!

DİSK Emekli-Sen

Central Executive Board"