Opposition’s Parliamentary inquiry into housing problem rejected by AKP, MHP

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The Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) and main opposition Republican People's Party (HDP) submitted a Parliamentary inquiry requesting that "the housing problem in Turkey be investigated."

The Parliamentary inquiry of the opposition has been rejected at the General Assembly with the votes of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and its ally Nationalist Movement Party (MHP).

While the inquiry was still being debated at the General Assembly of the Parliament, the opposition and the ruling People's Alliance had an argument about the "housing" problem in the country. While the opposition indicated that the problems faced by students must be solved, the AKP and MHP argued that there is not such a problem in Turkey.

'Students out of house and home'

HDP Diyarbakır MP Dersim Dağ talked about the inquiry and said:

"With the opening of universities, dozens of university students are faced with the question of 'Where will I stay? How will I make ends meet?' A student who has qualified for university cannot even be happy for the right to education or her achivement because students cannot find a place in dorms, they cannot find a house, they cannot make ends meet with a scholarship of 650 lira amid increasingly expensive living conditions.

"Dozens of students who have not been placed in dorms and do not have the opportunity to rent a house due to extremely high rents have been out of house and home this year. Students have been condemned to the dorms of religious cults and communities."

CHP İstanbul MP Mahmut Tanal also addressed the AKP and MHP MPs and asked, "Do the parents of these students not call you as much as they call us? Please, go and tell it to your chair, for God's sake. Tell him, 'They call us too, these students have a dormitory problem'."

'Erdoğan didn't call students "terrorists"'

Dismissing the criticisms of the opposition, MHP Parliamentary Group Deputy Chair Levent Bübül argued that they are working on the dormitory problem. Referring to the statements of the Deputy Interior Minister, Bülbül claimed that the students' problems are "abused."

AKP Group Deputy Chair Emin Akbaşoğlu said that President and AKP Chair Recep Tayyip Erdoğan did not call students "terrorists": "Our Dear President didn't call students 'terrorists'; he called the terrorists who are members of terrorist organizations and involved in the incidents to abuse students 'terrorists.' These are two different things. Don't distort the facts."

Following these debates, the Parliamentary inquiry of the CHP and HDP into the housing problem in Turkey has been rejected by the AKP and MHP.

'We have taken revolutionary steps'

AKP Spokesperson Ömer Çelik also addressed the reporters before the meeting of the AKP's Central Decision and Executive Committee.

Touching on the dormitory problem in response to a question, Çelik said, "Our Dear President even deals with how many students stay in a room. Dormitories are always on our agenda. We have taken several revolutionary steps about this issue. The capacity has increased by 10 times in our term." (SO/SD)