Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets in Istanbul March 29 after the government of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu arrested. Imamoglu was set to be Erdogan’s main opponent in the upcoming presidential election after 15 million people voted in a primary to nominate him as the Republican People’s Party (CHP) presidential candidate March 19.
“We are here today for our homeland,” 17-year-old Melis Basak Ergun said at one of the nightly protests at Istanbul City Hall, vowing protesters would never be cowed “by violence or tear gas.” Some 1,900 demonstrators have been arrested along with more than a dozen Turkish and international journalists.
Working people in Turkey face an economic and political crisis. Inflation topped 44% last year. For students joining the demonstrations, protester Talya Aydin said, “it’s about change, but it’s also the austerity measures that they’ve been forced to accept.”
“Journalists, union leaders and artists are also under attack. The goal is to silence the whole nation,” Arzu Cerkezoglu, president of the Confederation of Progressive Trade Unions of Turkey, said March 19. Members of teachers and textile workers unions have been placed under house arrest.
Kurdish politician Selahattin Demirtas was imprisoned in 2016, and in 2024 was sentenced to 42 years. He ran for president from prison in the last election. Some 2 million Kurds live in Istanbul, the largest city in Turkey.
At the demonstration, Ozgur Ozel, head of the CHP, called for the release of Imamoglu and Demirtas, saying protests will continue until they are free.
Imamoglu and 105 others, including several municipal officials, have been charged with corruption as well as aiding a “terrorist organization.” This charge refers to CHP coordination with the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party in the 2024 municipal elections. Battling for national rights for decades, there are 30 million Kurds in Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria — the largest oppressed nationality in the world without their own state.