Women for Equality Platform releases message on the first anniversary of the February 6 earthquakes: 'The situation is much more severe for women and children'

A year has passed since the February 6 earthquakes, which were centered in Kahramanmaraş and shook 13.5 million people across 11 cities.

The Women for Equality Platform (EŞİK) stated that the earthquake, which was turned into a disaster, has devastated women and children.

In the written statement, "The situation is much more severe for women and children. The burden on women, who are already forced to shoulder caregiving labor, has become even heavier with the earthquake. Furthermore, the violence they experience has also compounded. We will not give up on equality in disaster management, local governance, or anywhere else. We will not wait until the next earthquake." were the expressions used.

The full text of the written statement issued by the Women for Equality Platform (EŞİK) is as follows:

"What froze our blood was the discrimination, favoritism, rent-seeking, incompetence, opportunism, and public institutions competing with each other in failing to perform their duties that we witnessed before our eyes. For a year, we have watched and continue to watch with anger as the public's perception, rather than the disaster itself, is managed, and as the disaster is turned into an opportunity."

Today, much has happened in a year that is not surprising, as survivors are left impoverished and helpless, and this helplessness is used as election blackmail. We tried to document these in the report we published in the second month of the earthquake.

In the earthquake zone, the situation remains dire in many affected cities and villages, particularly in Hatay, Adıyaman, and Malatya. In Hatay, there are still people living in tents in the summer heat and winter cold. Container cities are muddy, roofs are leaking, and there are heating and infrastructure problems. There are cases where 8-10 people live together in a single container.

The situation is much more severe for women and children. The burden on women, who have had to shoulder caregiving responsibilities, has become even heavier with the earthquake. Furthermore, the violence they experience has also intensified. Their primary problems include housing, difficult living conditions, an insecure environment, unhealthy nutrition, education, transportation, hygiene, clean water, disruptions in health services, and unemployment. In other words, everything related to living a humane life. On top of all this, the cost of living has skyrocketed in the last year.  

Whether in tents or containers, women are trying to perform all household chores such as laundry, dishwashing, cleaning, and cooking under difficult living conditions with a lack of basic supplies. They are caring for their children, the sick, the elderly, their spouses, and needy relatives. There is no shuttle service, and public transportation is limited. Under these conditions, women are trying to take their children to school. Growth retardation has begun in children due to malnutrition. Basic hygiene cannot be maintained, epidemic diseases like scabies have emerged, and new health institutions have not been opened to replace those that were destroyed.

There are no job opportunities. Even when jobs are found, women cannot take them due to their caregiving responsibilities, as there are no services such as nursing homes or daycare centers. They are engaged in precarious, home-based work, doing whatever they can from containers. Due to transportation difficulties, girls are not being sent to school and are instead supporting caregiving tasks.

In Hatay, those who survived and migrated have still not been able to return. There is a massive black hole in the city that seems to have swallowed everything. Because property ownership is held by men, women are unable to benefit from limited state support. Stories are being told in the city about men who took the state support and fled, leaving many women behind.

In rural areas, women are being deprived of their livelihoods as olive groves and agricultural lands are declared reserve areas and opened up for TOKİ housing projects. They cannot even enter their fields to gather herbs or mushrooms. When they resist, they are subjected to pepper spray and batons. The women of Dikmece village are trying to resist both the burden of the earthquake and the difficulties of losing their sources of livelihood.

Another grave dimension of the situation is that domestic violence has increased, and women are being subjected to violence while under such heavy burdens, all while being unable to benefit from any public support mechanisms.

Unless women's care labor is socialized, unless healthy housing, nutrition, and employment opportunities are created, unless mechanisms to combat violence against women are regulated with disaster conditions in mind, and unless equality policies are implemented, the lives of women and children will become increasingly difficult.

It is essential that disaster-resilient cities are created and that the plans, infrastructure, and monitoring activities to be prepared are carried out in a gender-sensitive manner. Furthermore, increasing the disaster response capacity and authority of municipalities, and managing them with a purple-green and public-oriented municipal approach, is now a necessity. 

We will not give up on equality in disaster management, local governance, or anywhere else. We will not wait until the next earthquake. We have not forgotten, and we do not forgive..."