What I saw at Taksim Square

I cannot say that I haven’t seen more violent protests, but I’ve certainly not seen any of this magnitude thus far.


Faraz Talat June 05, 2013
The writer is a Rawalpindi-based medical student. He tweets @FarazTalat

I was a regular tourist, a museum buff, landing in Istanbul with little more than a working knowledge of Turkey’s political past and present. That was until the district I was staying in became engulfed in a battle between the people and the police.

Even as a foreigner, with no take on Turkey’s sociopolitical course, the air at Taksim Square awoke in me a sense of wonder no exhibit at the Topkapi Palace did.

It all started with a small group of concerned citizens protesting the uprooting of trees at Gezi Park for the construction of a shopping mall. The demonstrations were responded to, in the words of most analysts and onlookers, with ‘excessive use of force’.

Consequently, Occupy Gezi has snowballed into a colossal movement against the conservative ruling party, which has already been on thin ice with the nation’s secular progressives.

We were blissfully unaware of the storm brewing in our own backyard, until the receptionist warned us to stay away from Taksim Square. And so we did.

But the protests were not limited to the Square. Rioters were parading around the city, particularly the streets around the famous Galata Tower, a tourist hotspot. They were everywhere: chanting, singing and clapping. Their words begged no translation:

“Tayyip, isteefah! Tayyip isteefah!”

Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish prime minister, is now the focus of seething rage, emanating from the secular, leftist citizens of the country. They scream for his immediate resignation in light of his alleged failures in keeping the nation in line with Mustafa Kemal Ataturk’s vision. It’s being asked if Taksim Square could prove to be for Erdogan what Tahrir Square was for Hosni Mubarak.

The locals I spoke to were all unmistakably furious. A bartender from a nearby meyhane (Turkish bar), complained bitterly about a recently-passed legislation banning the advertisement of alcoholic beverages and their sale from 10.00pm to 6.00am. This effectively ends nightlife in a city with a high dependency on tourism, as most people prefer to drink late at night.

This is troubling for more than just the bar owners. Erdogan’s statements about wanting to raise a “pious generation”, coupled with a list of conservative actions, has sparked fears among a nation built on a strongly secular bedrock by Ataturk, the ‘Father of the Turks’.

Other locals have termed Gezi Park the ‘Hyde Park of Istanbul’. They cannot imagine this spot of green to be bulldozed and replaced with yet another shopping mall in an already endless span of stone and concrete.

I went up to Taksim Square a day after the security forces had retreated from the area and the fighting had ceased. I was overwhelmed by what I saw: men and women dancing in circles around the fabulous Monument of the Republic; demonstrators wearing Turkish flags as capes; graffiti everywhere; people roaming about in Guy Fawkes masks, proudly exhibiting the injuries they had sustained during the protests. The tear gas hadn’t completely dissipated yet, but I fought through the unease to witness this spectacle.

A police helicopter appeared overhead and the collective boos of thousands of people rocked the Square. This was the same dreaded helicopter that had been dropping tear gas canisters on to the crowd during the riots for the past couple of days. Then came the familiar chant: “Tayyip isteefah! Tayyip isteefah!”

This time, the harbinger merely shone its searchlight at the monument and flew away, followed by great victory applause from the people in the Square.

I cannot say that I haven’t seen more violent protests, but I’ve certainly not seen any of this magnitude thus far. At least, not personally. I hope the Turkish government, too, understands the scale of it and takes adequate steps to address the people’s demands because this situation is poised to explode given the tiniest of sparks.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 6th, 2013.                                                                                          

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COMMENTS (31)

Yasin | 10 years ago | Reply

@Abid P. Khan

@someone: “@Yasin: Well Ataturk did prove a point that when Islam kept out of Politics and government, it does wonder to the citizens.” .Do you seriously believe @Yasin: appreciates the point you are making? Abidji, you are taunting me, but it is ok. I appreciate his point but do not agree with him. I stand by what I said. Ataturk was anti Islam. A man like him cannot do any good to the people of a Muslim country. Here I quote from his writings. Read this garbage and think if I am right or wrong. “For nearly five hundred years, these rules and theories of an Arab Shaikh and the interpretations of generations of lazy and good-for-nothing priests have decided the civil and criminal law of Turkey. They have decided the form of the Constitution, the details of the lives of each Turk, his food, his hours of rising and sleeping the shape of his clothes, the routine of the midwife who produced his children, what he learned in his schools, his customs, his thoughts-even his most intimate habits. Islam – this theology of an immoral Arab – is a dead thing. Possibly it might have suited tribes in the desert. It is no good for modern, progressive state. God’s revelation! There is no God! These are only the chains by which the priests and bad rulers bound the people down. A ruler who needs religion is a weakling. No weaklings should rule!

gp65 | 10 years ago | Reply

ET Mods (2nd request) : I am responding to people who have written to me. Please allow a fact based polite response. IT is only fair.

@John the Baptist: "@gp65: Yes the government has the right to ignore the protestor’s dmands but it does not have the right to get violent with non-violent protestors. Oh, you mean like the indian army in Kashmir?"

Yes indeed. You do know however that violent protests are happening in Mirpur not Sri Nagar? Sr Nagar is seeing record number of tourists coming in. http://tribune.com.pk/story/555395/protesters-run-amok-in-mirpur/

@xyz: If you are referring to the Bari structure, it was clearly an unfortunate incident, so I will not defend it but it is important that you know facts instead of spewing half baked lies. It was not a worship place as you claim since in over 100 years, no namaz had been performed there since it was a disputed structure. Why was it disputed? BEcause Babar had destroyed a temple and while he copuld have built a mosque anywhere else, he chose to built it pon top of the temple he had destroyed to humiliate Hindus. The resentment against Babri structure was not because it was a mosque (it was not since Islam itself does not allow a place where no namaz has been read for 100 years to be called a mosque) but because it was a symbol of humiliation. Anyway, the incident happened 20 years back and no similar incidents have occurred anywhere in India in 20 years. In Pakistan in just the last 12 months, one Hindu temple was destroyed in Karachi despite court orders against the demolition, 3 churches were destroyed, a hundred Ahmadi graves were desecrated in Lahore, a150 Christian homes were burnt in Joseph Colony despite the fact that the police were aware that there was a plan to burn the homes, several imambargahs have been attacked. No action has been taken in any of these cases as one incident of oppression after another keeps occuring.

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