ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Turkey’s pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) on Sunday elected Medhat Sancar as the new male co-chair of the party and re-elected female co-chair Pervin Buldan during its fourth party congress in the Turkish capital Ankara.
The massive congress was attended by 30,000 people, including many leftist European MPs. Of the party’s 1,018 delegates, 838 were present to vote for the party council, discipline committee, and other administrative bodied.
More than 500 coachloads of supporters came from across Turkey, including the Kurdish-majority southeast, to participate in the congress, which organizers advertised under the Kurdish hashtag #VictoryCongress.
The message of Kurdistan Region Prime Minister Masrour Barzani, who shared his wish for peace in Turkey, was also read at the congress.
Mithat Sancar, a Turkish professor of public and constitutional law and a current HDP MP, was elected as the new co-leader. Pervin Buldan kept her seat as the female co-leader in an uncontested election. The HDP has 61 seats in Turkey’s parliament.
Now Turkey’s third largest party, the HDP was founded in 2012. It champions minority and women’s rights, environmentalism, and many other progressive policies. It operates on a co-chair system whereby a man and a woman share power. One is traditionally a Kurd and the other a Turk.
“We know that our odyssey has been rough, our ship has taken some heavy hits. Our captains have been arrested, alongside our senior crew. But what they don’t know is that the passengers of this ship are of tremendous resilience, and each is stronger than the next,” jailed former co-leaders Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksedag said in a message read to the congress.
“May our hearts and our souls be with you. May our word, our pens, and our prayers be with you. We send forth our love and regards to each of you. We congratulate our co-chairs and the party organization, with them we stand in solidarity,” the former co-leaders added.
“A big PES delegation in #Ankara at the #HDP4thCongress, supporting the fight for democracy and rule of law of @HDPgenelmerkezi,” the Party of European Socialists said in a tweet.
The HDP’s eight-year existence has not been smooth sailing. Following the July 2016 attempted coup against then-prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the HDP, despite condemning the coup, felt Erdogan’s wrath.
The HDP is accused by Ankara of being the political wing of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) – an armed group which has fought a decades-long struggle for the cultural and political rights of Kurds in Turkey. Turkey sees the group as a terrorist organization.
Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksekdag, together with several other HDP members and officials, were detained in November 2016 on terror-related charges. Most of them still remain in jail. At least nine more MPs were arrested, some of whom are still in jail.
A report by the HDP, covering the Turkish government’s crackdown between March and November 2019, indicates that 24 mayors have been removed and 13 detained during this period.
“Now it’s time for politics to return to the neighborhoods, to its roots. And that is what I will be doing, too. With these sentiments, I greet each & every one of you. Even though saying farewell is always sad, it also keeps the enthusiasm of new beginnings in its heart,” outgoing co-chair Sezai Temelli said in a speech to the congress.
“Of course, we have not arrived here easily. We have resisted! Thousands of our friends have been taken hostage, but we have become millions!” re-elected co-chair Buldan said in a speech.
“Tens of thousands of our people, party members are here in the Congress. This very much is an international congress,” Omer Ocalan, an HDP MP, told Rudaw.
“We struggle for Kurdistan’s freedom, independence. We in HDP as Kurdistan’s parliamentarians, we will continue this struggle,” Ocalan said.
“It is true that under the HDP’s umbrella, many ethnic, religious, ideological groups do politics, and we under that umbrella, we struggle for a free Kurdistan, for the interests of the Kurdish people,” he added.
