Women Call from İstanbul for March 8: Our Power is Our Unity
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Upon the call of the İstanbul March 8 Women's Platform, the March 8 International Women's Day meeting was held in Bakırköy market place in İstanbul with the participation of thousands of women yesterday (March 3).
Meeting in Bakırköy in İstanbul, women held placards which read, "Our power is our unity against crisis, violence, inequality; long live March 8", "All women of the world, unite" and "Femicides are political."
Women also chanted the slogans "Long live the solidarity of women", "We are not Cinderella, we are domestic laborers", "World would be shaken if women became free and "Jin, Jiyan, Azadi" (Women, World, Freedom in Kurdish) and carried banners which read "Leyla's demand is our demand", "Justice for Şule Çet", "Equal wage for equal work", "Don't whitewash rape, put it on trial" and "We don't keep silent, we don't fear, we don't obey."
The meeting was attended by thousands of women, including Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) Women's Assembly, Peoples' Democratic Women's Congress (HDK) Women's Assembly, Tevgêra Jinên Azad (TJA), Labor Party (EMEP), Socialist Party of the Oppressed (ESP), Flormar workers, HDP MPs Hüda Kaya and Züleyha Gülüm and representatives from several women's organizations. Women from the Union of Chambers of Turkish Engineers and Architects (TMMOB) had purple ribbons on their white safety helmets.
"We have a score to settle"
Reading the joint statement for the press on behalf of İstanbul March 8 Women's Platform, Sevgi Öztürk stated the following:
"This year, we have once again come together to raise our voices against violence, exploitation, oppression, masculine mentality, sexism, harassment, rape and massacre of women.
"Social conservatization, reactionary practices in the system of education and rearrangement of the curriculum in the light of religious references will also come to dominate the lives of next generations. When the insolence instilled from the top of the system meet the good conduct time and favors, an astromonical number of femicides and male violence occur.
"LGBTI+s are subjected to hate murders, harassment and violence on a daily basis, they are deprived of their conditions of a humanly life.
"We have a score to settle with the ones who disregard us, who condemn us to harassment and rape and make our labor invisible.
"Our struggle is not only for the women prevented from living; in this struggle, which will determine not only the fate of ours, but also that of the millions to come, and with our demands, which we will never give up on, we will continue to be and speak up everywhere where there is something that concerns the society, politics and humans."
Demands voiced by women in the demonstration
In their statement, women voiced a series of requests. They demanded justice for Şule Çet, who suspiciously died by falling off the 20th floor of a building; called Ministry of Justice to take action for trans inmate Buse, who has been on a hunger strike to have her gender transition surgery; and expressed solidarity with Flormar workers, who have been protesting for more than 300 days after they were dismissed from their jobs for unionizing.
Women also requested an end to the good conduct time given in cases of sexual abuse and withdrawal of the bill foreseeing amnesty for the abuser when he gets married with the woman. They also demanded that March 8 be declared as a leave of absence with pay.
Leyla Güven addressed the audience by phone
After the joint statement for the press, the letter written by Eylem Şen, the mother of four-year old Öykü Arin with leukemia, was read out. In her letter, Şen made a call to everyone to become a donor for her daughter Öykü.
HDP Hakkari MP and Co-Chair of Democratic Society Congress (DTK) Leyla Güven, who has been on a hunger strike since November 7, 2018, also addressed the audience in Bakırköy on the phone. Güven said,
"I wish a happy March 8 resistance day to you and all women of the world. I believe each coming day will be a precursor of new March 8s and freer days.
"We will help the rights and law of the women in society to reach the highest level by raising the resistance everyday. We have no doubts about that. Our hundreds of friends in prisons also say the same thing about this resistance. I am also honored to pioneer in such a protest.
"It is very valuable that you have come together. The struggle of women is very meaningful. Woman visitors give me a different enthusiasm. Looking from that perspective, we say that a single woman is subjected to violence, all women are subjected to violence. I am extending my love to all hearts and spirits who come together there. Goodbye."
Three people detained
It has been reported that two women from the Esenyurt Women's assembly and Sultanbeyli Co-Mayor candidate Ülker Özatik were taken into custody for carrying a TJA banner with the picture of Sakine Cansız on it. (EMK/HK/SD)