CHP İstanbul Chair slams government for cheese import from Venezuela

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"Just think about it: What does the government say to this country's young people, women and the aged, other than slogans full of valor and big, but empty words? The one is the enemy, the other is the traitor... What does the government say other than this?"

"Non-existing enemies, unfulfilled promises, statistics that have nothing to do with the reality and decisions taken hostilely to the people... I strongly reiterate it: They can never take away our hopes. Because we are right and, that is why, we will take back what is rightfully ours.

"With staff determined to solve the problems of the nation and with commonsense, we will bring the social state back to life with a strong parliamentary democracy and transparent understanding..."

It was how Canan Kaftancıoğlu, the İstanbul Provincial Chair of the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP), addressed the crowd in her press statement in Bakırköy, İstanbul yesterday (August 26).

In her speech, Kaftancıoğlu particularly criticized the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government's economy and agriculture policies.

'Our country has never been so weak'

"Our economy is getting worse and worse with each passing day," Kaftancıoğlu said, adding the following in brief:

"Millions of unemployed have lost their hopes of finding a job. Our recently graduated young people are in the grip of unemployment. Our shopkeepers are trying to do their best to keep their heads above the water.

"In these difficult times, the government offers debt, I mean, loans to people. In fact, it cannot even give loans. Until this government's term in office, our country has never been in such a weak condition to launch a fundraising campaign to support its citizens with a couple of pennies.

"A person who cannot even be a grocery boy, let alone being responsible for the economy of the country, says, 'What do we have to do with the dollar? It is the exchange rate: It falls and it rises.' In fact, due to the loss of value suffered by Turkish Lira, which they tell people mockingly, the prices of everything, even a needle, increases. The heavy toll caused by these wrong economy policies are now also on the shoulders of citizens."

Cheese import from Venezuela

Further in her speech, Kaftancıoğlu also criticized Turkey's decision to import cheese and some agricultural products from Venezuela without taxes.

"As per the Law on Agriculture, the state should have paid 175 billion Turkish Lira to farmers in support in the last 14 years; however, it has not yet paid it, which means that the state is indebted 80 thousand 754 lira to every farmer family," Kaftancıoğlu protested and briefly added the following:

"The government of the Palace has decided to import some agricultural products and cheese from Venezuela without taxes.

"With the decision it took at the Palace, it buys the products of farmers in Venezuela, rather than those in Turkey. The government favors importing cheese from Venezuela rather than our country, which is almost a heaven of cheese with nearly 200 types of cheese and comes in the first 10 countries of the world in terms of cheese production."

Within this context, Kaftancıoğlu also criticized the discourse of "local and national," which is quite frequently repeated by the ruling AKP, especially President and AKP Chair Erdoğan: "Pleading 'local and national' while they are shouting on the stand; but when they get off the stand, they import cheese to decrease the value of the cheese produced by its own citizens..." (EMK/SD)