Rais­ing Our Voic­es in Tak­sim Square

What began in Turkey sev­en days ago as the takeover of Gezi Park turned into a nation­al upris­ing from Istan­bul to oth­er major cities. A small protest to pro­tect pub­lic space – which the gov­ern­ment had ordered to be razed to make room for a shop­ping mall – unit­ed a wide range of cit­i­zens protest­ing what they see as the Prime Minister’s pro-busi­ness, author­i­tar­i­an, and reli­gious poli­cies. Tomor­row, June 4, the pub­lic sec­tor union coali­tion, KESK, will strike in sol­i­dar­i­ty with the protests.

This is a first-hand account from Tak­sim Square in Istan­bul, writ­ten by trade union leader Kıvanç Eli­açık, orig­i­nal­ly post­ed at Equal Times.

My trade union, the Rev­o­lu­tion­ary Work­er Unions Con­fed­er­a­tion of Turkey (DISK), is part of a plat­form with pro­fes­sion­al asso­ci­a­tions and neigh­bor­hood organ­i­sa­tions.

This plat­form protests the con­struc­tion work in Tak­sim Square, Istan­bul, that will demol­ish the park there, replac­ing it with a shop­ping cen­tre.

When I heard that bull­doz­ers came and cut the trees in the park on Tues­day, I ran to the park.

Instead of shut­ting down the ille­gal con­struc­tion – the court revoked the con­struc­tion project – the police used tear gas against peo­ple who want to save the trees.

On that first night, we took tents and sleep­ing bags and went to the park. We sang and chat­ted till dawn. In the evening, thou­sands of peo­ple were gath­ered. A con­cert took place on a stage.

We were dis­cussing urban regen­er­a­tion, envi­ron­men­tal destruc­tion, human rights and work­ers’ rights. The high­light of all these dis­cus­sions was that they are all the result of gov­ern­ment poli­cies. An ever-chang­ing and grow­ing com­mit­tee was estab­lished.

When I woke up in the morn­ing the camp was drowned into tear gas and every­one was run­ning around. The police set the tents on fire. They uproot­ed the saplings that were plant­ed a day before. The bull­doz­ers were work­ing under the pro­tec­tion of riot police.

We did not want to get revenge. Some­one was read­ing a nov­el to the police using a mega­phone that was saved from the fire. Anoth­er per­son was ask­ing “why did you set my gui­tar on fire?” but by singing.

When we suc­ceed­ed in enter­ing the park we set up big­ger tents. In the evening there were tens of thou­sands peo­ple in the Square. Renowned musi­cians can­celled their con­certs and came to the park.

Peo­ple from var­i­ous views came togeth­er: peo­ple and work­ers on strike from regions that have been harmed by cor­po­rate and gov­ern­ment greed; foot­ball fans; rad­i­cal left par­ties; stu­dent organ­i­sa­tions; fem­i­nists; anar­chists; and veg­ans.

The fol­low­ing night we were bet­ter pre­pared. The garbage was peri­od­i­cal­ly cleared. Vol­un­teer secu­ri­ty staff were on patrol. Women were able to walk com­fort­ably in the camp area.

The government’s new alco­hol reg­u­la­tions [Turkey’s pres­i­dent is this week expect­ed to approve strict leg­is­la­tion that will pro­hib­it the sale of alco­hol in shops between 22.00 and 06.00, ban all alco­hol adver­tis­ing and pro­mo­tion, and stop new shops and bars from open­ing with­in 100m of schools and mosques] con­vert­ed drink­ing to a polit­i­cal action. Peo­ple were chant­i­ng slo­gans, on the oth­er hand they were singing songs, and drink­ing.

Towards the morn­ing hun­dreds of gog­gles, gas masks, lemon, vine­gar, home-made anti-tear gas solu­tions pre­pared by stom­ach pills were dis­trib­uted.

There were thou­sands of peo­ple in the park when the police attacked at 05.00 in the morn­ing. There were no warn­ings and sud­den­ly we were unable to see any­thing. We evac­u­at­ed the park in-line with the plan we made ear­li­er.

Clash­es in the street con­tin­ued till morn­ing. I man­aged to sneak in the park qui­et­ly, tak­ing advan­tage of the tired police. I watched the Bospho­rus sip­ping my tea in the shad­ow of a tree. I hope it won’t be the last time I see this view.

The pro­tes­tors tried to enter the park by gath­er­ing in back streets again and again. The police pre­vent­ed them by using exces­sive use of force. The whole city turned into a ral­ly are­na. Some demon­stra­tors walked the Bospho­rus Bridge that con­nects Asia and Europe.

So, who are these peo­ple that gath­ered in the square? It won’t be true to say that these peo­ple have com­mon views and com­mon aims. The only com­mon thing was they were angry to the gov­ern­ment… The police vio­lence against the youth who want­ed to pro­tect the trees trig­gered peo­ple and all the peo­ple who are against the gov­ern­ment were out on the streets.

Thou­sands of women and men who have not par­tic­i­pat­ed in a polit­i­cal demon­stra­tion before clashed with the police till late at night. The entered a new demon­stra­tion with­out event hav­ing break­fast.

With their home-made gas masks they revolt­ed against the police some­times by singing, some­times by swear­ing.

There were demon­stra­tors from wealthy fam­i­lies, but also unem­ployed peo­ple. There were peo­ple from Mus­lim asso­ci­a­tions and social­ist par­ties – every­one stand­ing shoul­der to shoul­der.

Peo­ple, who sought refuge in the bar­ri­cades, were tweet­ing and upload­ing pho­tos to Insta­gram. Pupils were draw­ing nasty graf­fi­ti address­ing the Prime Min­is­ter, Recep Tayyip Erdo­gan.

I met a cou­ple who were mak­ing plans for their wed­ding in the tele­phone booth where I shel­tered as rub­ber bul­lets rained down around me.

For the past five days, a grow­ing num­ber of demon­stra­tors are hav­ing fun and demon­strat­ing at the same time with­out sleep­ing or rest­ing. The most com­mon slo­gan chant­ed by the pro­tes­tors is “Resign Gov­ern­ment!”

Police vio­lence is not dri­ving us away. Fear has been defeat­ed now. We have learned to raise our voice when we are angry.

Some peo­ple are fight­ing, oth­ers are danc­ing. Some are lash­ing out drunk; oth­ers are col­lect­ing garbage and treat­ing stray ani­mals.

I do not know what is going to hap­pen tomor­row. But today is a new day and we are all new peo­ple.

What am I doing now? While tens of thou­sands of demon­stra­tors across the coun­try are ask­ing the Prime Min­is­ter to resign for many dif­fer­ent rea­sons, I am writ­ing to you on the motor hood of a knocked-over police car.

Kıvanç Eli­açık is the Direc­tor of the Inter­na­tion­al Rela­tions Depart­ment of the Con­fed­er­a­tion of Pro­gres­sive Trade Unions of Turkey (DISK).