Has the liquidation of feudalism and tribes been considered in the 'Terror-Free Turkey' Law?

At the end of his article titled "Is the Kurdish issue 100 years old?" dated August 19, 2026, in Ege Meclisi, Prof. Dr. Hakkı Uyar stated: " … The secular nation-state that the Republic set out to build wanted to liquidate the feudal and autonomous centers in the provinces as a common goal. This effort, which lasted from the beginning of the 19th century to the middle of the 20th century, was met with the resistance and rebellion of the centers that were intended to be liquidated. What makes this process more complex is the intervention of imperialism in the process. The PKK and its extensions are also right in the middle of this 200-year process. At this point, it is necessary to identify the problem correctly. A correct identification brings the correct solution with it."

Uyar’s assessment that "The secular nation-state that the Republic set out to build wanted to liquidate the feudal and autonomous centers in the provinces as a common goal" is at the very heart of the truth.

In the articles I have written for years, I have been trying to reflect this aspect of the issue, in other words, its political economy.

In fact, we know that Atatürk constantly brought up the issue of liquidating feudal and autonomous centers in his opening speeches to the Grand National Assembly of Turkey (TBMM). For example, he said in his "TBMM Opening Speech on November 1, 1937: 'Once, there should be no landless farmers left in the country. More importantly, it is necessary to classify the land that can support a farmer's family, which cannot be divided for any reason or manner, according to the population density and soil fertility of the region where the land is located, regarding the size of the land that large farmers and farm owners can operate.'"

What is the feudal order that persists in Eastern and Southeastern Anatolia?

The feudal structure, as is known, is a system that emerges on the basis of land ownership and personal loyalty in the social hierarchy. In this hierarchy, there are landlords, tribal leaders, religious sect sheikhs, and ethnic and religious politicians and political approaches that feed off them, which are on Turkey's agenda.

In short, in the region where the Kurdish separatist movement, the PKK, is dominant, land ownership is under the control of landlords under tribal organization.

On the lands belonging to the landlords, the poor Kurdish peasant tries to maintain his existence half-hungry and half-full. In elections, votes are cast en masse, and the lords enter the parliament. Members of parliament and mayors are usually either landlords or their relatives...

Landlords continue to remain in power by sharing political parties among themselves, regardless of the method.

Industrialists and merchants are also in a similar class structure.

Some of the Kurdish peasants engage in animal husbandry without being tied to the land, but some of them have had to give up animal husbandry for security reasons. Education and health services in the region are also far from meeting the demand.

The masses coming to the cities are unemployed because the industry and service sectors have not developed sufficiently.

At the point we have reached, another change has also taken place. They have made the landlords and lords establish cooperatives in the region and put them at the head of them. Thus, a model of cooperativism that is not observed in any other region of the world has emerged. I called this new cooperativism "Aga-Koop". Now, the poor peasants of the region are equal(!) partners on paper of the cooperative called Aga-Koop, but they continue to live on a subsistence level just as they did in the past.

In the Southeast and East, landlords have continued to remain in power until today by sharing political parties among themselves, regardless of the method.

Some findings regarding Feudalism and Tribal Culture

• More than 41 percent of the land in Diyarbakır is under the control of 3 percent of the families.

• In Şanlıurfa, nearly 30 percent of the nearly 10 million decares of land belongs to 1.5 percent of the families.

• The Brukan tribe has 115 villages in Van alone; the tribe also has many villages in cities such as Kars and Iğdır; it is stated that they keep at least 500 thousand people under control. Remzi Kartal, the current leader of the tribe, is the Co-Chair of KONGRA-GEL (Kurdistan People's Congress), the European structure of the PKK narco-terror organization. Remzi Kartal is also the nephew of Kinyas Kartal, the former leader of the Brukan tribe and former deputy who said, "I was the one who closed the Village Institutes." Kinyas Kartal had also used the expression, "These people are more loyal to me than to the state." Let us remind you that he was one of the tribal and land lords who opposed the Land Reform Law for Farmers in 1945.

• There is no official record of how many villages and how much agricultural land the family of Ahmet Türk, one of the leaders of the Kanco tribe in Derik, Mardin, and a member of the DEM Party, has. There are allegations on social media that he has more than 40 villages and 30 thousand dönüm of land assets.

• A dense exploitation of labor also emerges with "Seasonal Agricultural Labor" created by feudalism.

The most important reason for migration is landlessness or having little land. The rate of those who previously owned any land among those who migrated to the city is extremely low. Only 7 percent of the families have agricultural land in their villages, and the average size of these lands is less than 10 dönüm.

• Isn't the silence of those living in the village and a former deputy in the Narin murder, which breaks our hearts on Turkey's agenda, a result of tribal culture? Is there any difference between this and the "Law of Silence" called "Omerta" in the mafia order?

• According to media reports dated October 3, 2025, the Hülya-Emrah Gökçe couple from the Jirki Tribe got married in a wedding that lasted 2 days and 2 nights in Başaran Village of Beytüşşebap District of Şırnak. 3 million TL was pinned on the groom and 1.5 kilos of gold on the bride.

Has the Liquidation of Feudalism and Tribes Been Considered in the Terror-Free Turkey Law?

In the Terror-Free Turkey Law, landless peasants, sharecroppers, the unemployed piled up in cities, workers working for a subsistence wage, young people who could not find educational opportunities, in short, the Kurdish poor, are nowhere to be seen.

Even worse, there are no economic regulations aimed at their economic needs, their liberation processes, in short, their living like human beings.

Was the opinion of the Kurdish poor taken on the Terror-Free Turkey agenda?

In the package for the solution of the Kurdish issue, were the opinions of the representatives of the Kurdish poor in labor mass organizations such as unions and cooperatives taken?

Are there any findings and proposals in the election programs of the parties that mention land reform? What happened to the Land Reform that we once discussed?

Those who speak on their behalf are; feudal lords who have entered the parliament, industrialists and merchants of the region who have not broken their ties with feudalism, in short, the layers that feed on the Kurdish poor.

Let us mention it. Articles were written and proposals were made stating that the problems primarily stem from the unequal land distribution existing in the region, but the ruling and opposition parties did not want to address this issue, and they are not doing so. Because it suits them to obtain collective votes with the culture of obedience created by the feudal order.

What is the solution for the liquidation of Feudalism and Tribes?

The first stage of the starting point of the political-economic analysis for the liquidation of feudalism and tribes is Land Reform. Land Reform is the provision of sufficient land to landless or small-landholding peasants, which Atatürk constantly mentioned. In fact, Article 44 of the Constitution of the Republic of Turkey makes this mandatory.

• Land Reform should not only include land distribution. At the same time, a "Regional Development Plan covering Land Reform" that will liquidate the feudal structure in the region should be put into effect.

• Along with Land Reform, industrialization should be accelerated in the region through state economic enterprises. In such an approach, the State should also be a guide and investor in the region.

If the issue is not handled in terms of integrity, the distributed lands will pass into the hands of the powerful again.

To prevent this, it is essential to handle land reform with the cooperative organization of agricultural enterprises.

Here, cooperatives should be taken as a basis, starting from the supply of inputs to the marketing of outputs.

In this context, peasants should become industrialists through cooperatives.

(*) Prof. Dr. Halil İnalcık had said regarding the imperial leg of the issue called the "Kurdish Issue": "The EU and the USA are supporting the Kurds today; Armenians and Kurds are now very hopeful for themselves from America's new 'divide-and-rule' policy in the Middle East... In my opinion, all of these are nothing more than the continuation of the 'Eastern Question' policy in Europe in the 19th century."