Tensions had risen in Turkey’s southeastern Kurdish province of Van after the justice ministry objected to Van court’s decision to appoint DEM Party’s mayoral candidate Abdullah Zeydan, rendering his candidacy invalid despite winning the election in a landslide and handing the post to the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) candidate, who garnered the second-highest number of votes.
DEM Party on Wednesday evening announced that its appeal against the justice ministry’s decision was accepted by the electoral body.
“The Supreme Election Council (YSK) has decided to grant the mandate to our Co-Mayor of Van, Abdullah Zeydan, thanks to the resistance of the Kurdish people, our comrades, friends, and the democratic public,” the pro-Kurdish party said on X.
Following the decision to strip Zeydan of the mayoralty, protests and demonstrations erupted across Kurdish cities. The Turkish interior ministry announced on Wednesday that it had detained 89 protesters across the country for “demonstrating without permission, shouting praises and supportive slogans” of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
Despite a ban on protests announced by Van’s governorate the previous day, thousands of protesters poured into the streets and were joined by co-chairs of the DEM Party and several politicians from other opposition parties including the Republican People’s Party (CHP) and the Workers Party of Turkey (TIP).
“The [people’s] response has been given both at Newroz and here, the Kurdish people's demands for democracy cannot be suppressed by pressure and appointing trustees,” said Tuncer Bakirhan, DEM Party co-chair at the demonstrations in Van.
“Our call to the AK Party government is that as long as you usurp the will of the people, you are doomed to lose,” he added.
Veteran Kurdish politician Leyla Zana who was also among the protesters, called on the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to respect the will of the people of Van.
“When the choice of the Kurds is elected, democracy disappears. Respect the will of these people," Zana said.
According to preliminary results of Sunday’s polls, the DEM party garnered 5.7 percent of the overall votes across the country. The party won the mayoralty of Van as well as nine more Kurdish provinces in the country’s southeast.
In the 2019 local elections, the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), DEM Party’s sister party won the mayoralty in eight provinces, only to see dozens of elected pro-Kurdish mayors ousted from office and replaced with state-linked trustees over the years, due to their alleged links with the PKK.
