BARCELONA, Spain – Songs and language have always gone hand-in-hand with nationalism, especially for nations aspiring to their own homeland and fighting to keep alive language and culture. This is true for a Kurd in Diyarbakir or a Catalan dreaming of independence in Spain.
For the Kurds, the foremost singer who for decades kept alive the Kurdish language and yearning for “Kurdistan” is Sivan Perwer, who returned from 37 years in exile to sing Sunday in Turkey’s Kurdish heartland of Diyarbakir.
Perwer, 57, once said that he sings because it “alleviates my nation's pains and sharpens their rage."
Before thousands of fans – and only a short distance from where he was born and went into exile for his songs – Perwer on Sunday performed one of his most famous songs, Megri, Daye Megri (Don’t cry, mother don’t cry), in a duet with Ibrahim Tatlises, another icon of Kurdish music.
In 1976, when Perwer went into exile in Germany for refusing to give up singing in his mother tongue, in Spain General Francisco Franco had just died the year before. At the time, the country’s northern Catalonia region was struggling to keep alive the Catalan language and nationalism that had been banned by the Spanish dictator.
Singers like Raimon, Joan Manuel Serrat, Lluís Llach or Ovidi Montllor were the Sivan Perwer’s of Catalonia, keeping alive the banned language and idea of Catalonia.
“Exile is one of the most bitter experiences a man can suffer,” Serrat once said about his own forced stay in Mexico.
“There was no concert in which people would not ask for freedom, amnesty (for prisoners) and autonomy for the region,” Miquel-Lluis Muntane, a Catalan poet and journalist who was also a songwriter during the dictatorship, told Rudaw.
“The fact that Perwer is now welcome in Turkey is a symbolic phenomenon, representing the historic changes that Turkey has now undergone,” Dr Dlawer Ala'Aldeen, former education minister in the Kurdistan Regional Government and currently a professor at the University of Nottingham, told Rudaw.
The changes in Turkey are indeed historic.
Until 11 years ago, to speak and sing publicly in Kurdish was barred and punished under a heavy-handed rule. It is only since 2012 that the Kurdish language can be taught in schools. Only two years ago, female Kurdish singer Raziye Kizil was jailed for singing folk songs in her ethnic tongue.
“This country has lived through many ages and empires, but this is a new era, it is the era of peace and democracy. We all need to live in peace regardless of our culture and language,” Perwer told his fans in Diyarbakir.
“His songs were banned by Turkish, Iraqi, Iranian and Syrian governments,” recalled Ala'Aldeen. The lyrics “fueled enthusiasm in people and freedom fighters throughout the 1970s and 1980s,” he said.
Perwer was the “surprise” brought by Kurdistan Region President Massoud Barzani, whose own weekend visit to Diyarbakir was no less than historic.
“The days when the blood of a young Turkish man was spilled by a Kurdish youth or the blood of a young Kurdish man was spilled by a Turkish youth are over,” Barzani said in a speech in the heart of Turkey’s Kurdish nationalism.
“Perwer's return is part of the same changes that let Turkey invite Barzani to visit Diyarbakir,” said Ala'Aldeen.
For Kenan Aksu, director of the Diyarbakır Culture, Tourism and Music Association, Perwer's coming “is a great contribution to the peace process, as is the coming of Barzani.”
“It was illegal to listen to his songs for a very long time and people used to listen his recordings secretly,” Aksu recalled to Rudaw.
Barcelona-based international football agent Bayram Tutumlu told Rudaw that Perwer’s return was welcome.
“Perwer is the Kurdish Pavarotti, a man of peace and a man who serves his homeland,” said Tutumlu, who is a Turkish-born Kurd.
Catalonia, with 7.5 million inhabitants, is an autonomous region of Spain since 1979. The Catalan government has announced its intention to hold a referendum on possible independence from Spain in 2014.
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