Why don’t you extend hands to each other?
MEHMET ALİ BİRAND
21/10/2011
mab@hurriyet.com.tr
I listened to the prime minister while I was in Ankara on Thursday. He complained about the opposition. Also about the media.
“Why can they not be constructive? Why are they always destructive?” he said.
He spoke as if he had erased the Peace and Democracy Party (BDP). Whereas he had said a short while ago that he cared about the dialogue with the BDP.
The party that he wanted to cooperate was Republican People’s Party (CHP). It was obvious that he saw the CHP as a party he could take steps together with but that he was not used to leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu’s stance.
After the prime minister, I went to Kılıçdaroğlu who was the guest on my TV show, the 32nd Day, this week. I asked, “Why don’t you cooperate? The Kurdish issue is above the parties; it is the issue of all of us. Why don’t you open your door?”
Kılıçdaroğlu explained extensively.
The impression I got was that if the prime minister extended his hand, the CHP would not leave that hand in the air. The same goes for Erdoğan.
Well, why doesn’t it happen then? Why can’t these two leaders take that step?
Kılıçdaroğlu gave a blank check on the 32nd Day. He opened his door to the prime minister. Let us see if Erdoğan adopts this initiative…
The leaders must know that the public does not want a fight; they want cooperation, especially on the topic of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
Well then, take those steps and relieve the public.
It’s good that Bartholomew I has been in office for 20 years
The hearts of 300 million Orthodox in the world will beat in Istanbul today.
Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew’s 20th anniversary as the head of the Orthodox Church will be marked. For a reverend who has both led his church and the relations with the Turkish Republic for 20 years without any road accident, there cannot be another anniversary more proud than this.
Actually, there was going to be a major ceremony to be held at the Haliç Congress Center on Oct. 22. The prime minister was also expected to attend. This ceremony was going to be one that no patriarch has ever been privileged with but the Patriarchate demonstrated its sensitivity for the martyrs. It limited the huge ceremony which originally contained a concert to a modest reception at the Assembly Hall of the Galata Primary School. Our generation opened its eyes with Athenagoras.
The Turkey of the 1950s and 1960s was very different. The state and the media that worked as the spokesman of the state depicted Athenagoras as a bogeyman. The Patriarchate was a center of discord. It was a period when the Turkish-Greek relationship was deteriorating because of Cyprus. Slandering the patriarch was almost tantamount to heroism. We were a narrow-minded, closed society. Even the name of the patriarch was weird at those times. He was called “Patriarch of Fener” and was belittled.
Bartholomew I, in that sense, became a patriarch in a better period.
He took office at a time while Turkey was gradually changing, its self-confidence was increasing and as Turkish-Greek relations were getting back on track. Since 2003, with the Justice and Development Party’s (Ak Party) ascent to power, a new era has started. Of course, it was Bartholomew I who made the biggest contribution to this process.
He did not act aggressively. He was always constructive. He did not create problems; he solved them. He evaluated Ankara’s situation very well and acted sensibly.
He did not utter one negative word while abroad. On the contrary, he became the leader who supported the European Union accession efforts the most.
In a nutshell, Bartholomew I was a great boon for us, too.
