Elected female deputies, mayors, journalists, revolutionaries, tens of thousands of political prisoners are held hostage in prisons and left for dead. Prisons are now the government’s official murder scene, and women are intended to be executed through a mass murder committed even in the smallest cell of Turkey’s prisons. Today, hundreds of political prisoners live on the edge of death from health problems in Turkish prisons. The unexplained death of Garibe Gezer, who was tortured and raped for refusing to obey the prison administration, and the medical institution’s failure to give a health assessment report to secure the release of political prisoner Aysel Tugluk, despite not being able to live unassisted, is a concrete expression of the state’s misogyny and ambition of revenge. Our mothers, like Emine Şenyaşar, who have been on a vigil for justice for days to prevent the deaths of their children in the dungeons, are in front of the courthouse every day, asking for accountability for those responsible for the massacre of their families. Also, Gulistan Doku’s mother and sister who were made to disappear in Dersim province have become the common voice of all women.
Women call for March 8 protests despite police blockade
The women from Sarigazi Istanbul in Turkey planned to gather and hold a march to commemorate Women’s Day. However, the Turkish police blocked the streets to prevent any women’s day celebration. A woman speaker said, “Barricade the murderers, not women.” Despite all the police’s obstructions, the women held the rally and read a statement calling for actions to be held on the occasion of International Women’s Day on March 8.
The women calling for all women to participate in the celebrations issued a press release.
“March 8th; It is the torch that women who burn themselves for freedom and equality hold for our future. It is a symbol of the struggle to create a life woven with a free woman. March 8th is the rumbling of the hearts of us women. Today, we fill the fields to organize all the women of the world to change life and the world in favor of women, and we shout in our strongest voice that ‘today I exist, I was there yesterday, and I will exist tomorrow.’ We unite our voices for equality, justice, freedom, labor, peace, and solidarity. We continue to fly the flag that we inherited from the women who fought for this cause.”
Women are subjected to violence, harassment, rape, and killed in all areas of life; the statement said, “As long as unequal, unfair, gender-blind male-state violence continues, and measures are not taken to end discrimination against women, murders, harassment, rape and violence against women will continue. Laws have no legitimacy if they fail to protect women’s right to work, her body, and her life. The patriarchal state, which canceled the Istanbul Convention, shows its true face with its misogynistic policies and laws and deepens its war on women’s freedom and struggle by narrowing the living spaces of us women every day.”
“Women are either employed on low wages in the interests of capital or devalued by ignoring women’s labor”
The statement also touched on the cost of living and rising inflation, reminding working women who resisted:
Today, uncertainty in economic policies, the rise in inflation, the fluctuation in the exchange rate were reflected in the market as a hike in the prices. During covid-19, which still has an impact worldwide, women have been impoverished, forced to close their homes, and domestic labor has been devalued and made dependent on men and the state. The reality of history has come to make women who provide labor and socialize it collect rotten fruits in the neighborhood markets today and wait in the snow in the winter in lines for cheap bread. By the hand of the presidential decree, society is forced to be left hopeless, impoverished by unemployment, forced exiles, and growing impoverishment caused by the economic crisis. In the grip of capitalism, women are either employed with low wages in the interests of capital or devalued by ignoring women’s labor. In this environment, we welcome March 8th with the struggle and gains of women working in Farpla and Migros who are resisting to protect the labor and the rights in the society we live in today.
Aysel Tugluk, Garibe Gezer, Emine Şenyaşar, Aygül Doku and others
Elected female deputies, mayors, journalists, revolutionaries, tens of thousands of political prisoners are held hostage in prisons and left for dead. Prisons are now the government’s official murder scene, and women are intended to be executed through a mass murder committed even in the smallest cell of Turkey’s prisons. Today, hundreds of political prisoners live on the edge of death from health problems in Turkish prisons. The unexplained death of Garibe Gezer, who was tortured and raped for refusing to obey the prison administration, and the medical institution’s failure to give a health assessment report to secure the release of political prisoner Aysel Tugluk, despite not being able to live unassisted, is a concrete expression of the state’s misogyny and ambition of revenge. Our mothers, like Emine Şenyaşar, who have been on a vigil for justice for days to prevent the deaths of their children in the dungeons, are in front of the courthouse every day, asking for accountability for those responsible for the massacre of their families. Also, Gulistan Doku’s mother and sister who were made to disappear in Dersim province have become the common voice of all women.
“We know what war means to women, and we are the power that will change it.”
Sarıgazili kadınlardan polis engeline rağmen 8 Mart eylemlerine çağrıhttps://t.co/JR7SKbPas6 pic.twitter.com/0ksWaq19AK
— sendika.org (@sendika_org) March 5, 2022
The statement on the Ukraine-Russia war said:
Where there is war, there is poverty and exploitation. Then there is no justice, and women live the pain and tragedy, as in Syria, Iraq, and our geography. Women pay the most. Those who turned the Middle East into a bloodbath, and today the ongoing market fight between the imperialist blocs, threw the Ukrainian people into the ring of fire. As long as the polarization between the United States-NATO, and Russia-China, and the war continues, the conflict will fill the coffers of the rich, and the people will be condemned to poverty. The war, which has no clean face, shows us another side for women and makes violence against women more acceptable. Rape is one of these war strategies. We are a voice for the voice of women who are oppressed, exploited, and murdered in the war of imperialist, masculine powers. So we know what war means to women, and we are the force that will change it.
At the end of the statement, women calling for actions on International Women’s Day on March 8 celebrated the event with folk dances.
Sendika.org News (MB)