On 30 January, the live stream from the Turkish parliament was briefly switched off. The violent protests of the DEM party, TIP, CHP and Saadet factions against the unconstitutional decision to deprived of his mandate the imprisoned TIP Hatay MP, Can Atalay, should not reach the people. The MPs had moved to the desk of the Deputy Speaker of Parliament and Minister of Justice, Bekir Bozdağ. The MPs chanted “Freedom for Can Atalay”. From the group, a Turkish constitution was thrown at the parliamentary presidency.

Separation of powers in Turkey is not worth the paper it is written on

Human rights lawyer Can Atalay was sentenced to 18 years for “conspiracy against the government” in 2022 in a trial surrounding the Gezi protests. He was accused of supporting philanthropist Osman Kavala, who was sentenced to aggravated life imprisonment for “conspiracy” in a fabricated political trial.

In the parliamentary election on 14 May 2023, Atalay was elected to parliament for TIP (Workers' Party of Turkey). The verdict against Atalay was confirmed by the Court of Cassation. Nevertheless, Atalay should have been released after his election, but the Court of Cassation refused to release him. However, at Atalay's request, the Constitutional Court, which actually has the final say in such cases, found that the Court of Cassation had thereby violated his right to stand for election and his right to political activity and ordered his release. Again, he was refused release, in clear violation of the constitution. The Court of Cassation went even further and filed a complaint against the constitutional judges for exceeding their jurisdiction. The Court of Cassation actually overstepped its jurisdiction by ordering the withdrawal of Atalay's mandate. But only Parliament can decide this. The AKP-MHP majority pushed through this decision on 30 January.

Bayındır: “We will not give up”

The co-chair of the Party of Democratic Regions (DBP), Keskin Bayındır, aptly described the action as a coup mechanism and said that new such “coups against democratic politics” were inevitable as long as the Kurdish issue was not resolved. He accused the regime of not even recognizing its own laws and of completely disregarding the will of the people.

He recalled the history of this approach: “It is undoubtedly not the first time that we have seen this coup mechanism at work. This mechanism of directly attacking the will of the people and the path to democratic struggle has its roots in the 1990s. In 1994, the DEP deputies were eliminated in a political coup, and today the same thing is taking under the AKP-MHP government. The attitude of the 1990s, which sought to hinder the Kurdish people's struggle for democracy by arresting MPs and banning political parties, has today been updated and has transformed into a regime that completely disregards the will of the people. The political coup against the HDP on 4 November 2016 and the subsequent stripping of the mandate of Leyla Güven and Musa Farisoğulları should also not be forgotten."

Through party bans, the imprisonment of elected officials and the appointment of trustees over democratically governed municipalities, the will of "millions of people” is being usurped, the politician said, adding: “The reason why this coup mechanism continues to work is that a serious and strong understanding of struggle has not yet been created. That is why we insist on solving the Kurdish question. The government disregards the will of the Kurdish people and attacks all areas and dynamics of society at will. As long as the Kurdish question remains unsolved, it is inevitable that new coups will develop against the channels of democratic politics. It should be clear that this decision [on Can Atalay] has no validity for us. We will neither recognize this decision nor take a step back in the face of this coup policy. We will continue our fight for democratic policies against the government that openly breaks the law.”