Party Chairman Admits Party Killed Writer and Jailed Poet

Republican People’s Party Chairman Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu stated that the Law on the Protection of Atatürk should be removed. Photo: Today's Zaman

The Law on the Protection of Atatürk, adopted during the time of the Adnan Menderes government in the late ’50s, should be removed because it is nonsensical to adopt a special law for Atatürk or any other person, main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu has told the Cihan news agency.

Commenting on the Law on the Protection of Atatürk, Kılıçdaroğlu said, “Atatürk was a person who was raised in the bosom of the nation and he was a person who did the country a great service, but it is nonsensical to adopt a special protection law for Atatürk or for any other person.”

Kılıçdaroğlu also admitted that the CHP was behind the 1948 killing of renowned Turkish poet and writer Sabahattin Ali, during a television program on Thursday.

Kılıçdaroğlu, who recently spoke in critical terms of several acts committed by the CHP during its 27 years of single-party rule in the early years of the Turkish Republic, said that it was the CHP that killed Ali and imprisoned renowned Turkish poet Nazım Hikmet for his political ideas. “Who sent Nazım Hikmet to jail? Who killed Sabahattin Ali? The CHP. We will always admit the reality, but it is not correct to abuse the wrongdoings of the CHP,” he said.

“Who sent Nazım Hikmet to jail? Who killed Sabahattin Ali? The CHP.” – Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, Republican People’s Party Chairman

Ali, known for his strong opposition to the state, was convicted of insulting Mustafa Kemal Atatürk in one of his poems in 1932. He served time in the Konya and Sinop prisons but was released after a general amnesty granted on the 10th anniversary of the republic in 1933. Ali was murdered while trying to flee the country on April 1, 1948. His body was found on June 16. It became obvious that Ali Ertekin, a smuggler, was the killer; however, the motive behind the murder had remained a mystery.

As for Hikmet, he was one of the greatest international poets of the 20th century. He used to be seen as a controversial figure in Turkey due to his communist and “romantic” revolutionary ideas. He was repeatedly arrested for his political beliefs and spent much of his adult life in prison or exile. He died of a heart attack in Moscow on June 3, 1963.

This was not the first time that Kılıçdaroğlu criticized the period of single-party rule. Kılıçdaroğlu said last month that he does not find right some of the acts carried out by the CHP during that period.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has often criticized the actions of the CHP during the single-party period and says the CHP should face its history, but the CHP leadership has always defended the period by pointing to the conditions in the country at the time. Kılıçdaroğlu’s admission was the first time a high-ranking CHP official voiced criticism of the CHP over its actions during the single-party era.

Arguing that seeing the single-party period as solely a CHP period is not right, either, he said social democracy did not exist in Turkey at the time and so the CHP was not yet a social democrat party.

Kılıçdaroğlu commented on the issue of apologizing for the Dersim events that took place in 1937 in the predominantly Alevi region of Dersim during the period of single-party rule by saying that he would not apologize for the Dersim events and added that he himself is “one of the victims of the Dersim events.” He says he experienced the brutal events that occurred in Dersim at the time. If it is necessary to apologize, the state should apologize to him for what he experienced at that time.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan apologized in November of last year for a 1937 massacre on behalf of the Turkish state, but said the CHP, which was the only political party at the time, is the actual culprit and called on the party’s current leader to apologize for the incident on behalf of the CHP.

This article was originally published on February 10th on TodaysZaman.com. It is reprinted with permission