Tens of thousands of workers attended the May 1 meeting in İstanbul’s Maltepe district as the Communist Party of Turkey (TKP) marked the rally with its massive participation with the slogan: This social order must change!
As thousands of people were marching through several paths into the meeting area, the TKP and the Communist Youth of Turkey (TKG) addressed the workers from a party podium. The demonstration started as thousands chanted the Internationale anthem.
TKP: ‘THIS SOCIAL ORDER MUST CHANGE’
“This social order will change with struggle. The reign of money will end. This lie and this falseness and plundering will end, and this social order will collapse. We are standing, we are marching,” Orhan Aydın, communist actor, addressed the thousands.
In the name of the Communist Youth, Ahmet Batur took to the stage. Talking about the government’s plan to split up several universities, Batur underlined that this is a reactionary and anti-scientific project.
Batur said that those who ban student festivals under the pretext of the ongoing state of emergency allow Turkey’s top capitalist Koç Group to hold events at campuses, adding that the students from Middle East Technical University struggled and prevented the capitalist event. Batur also indicated to the university youth who resist against the government’s split-up project at several universities around the country.
Revealing that the students have to work while studying in order to survive and meet their needs and housing fees, Batur said, “The youth have actual problems in Turkey. There is no political party but the TKP that provides solutions,” adding that the youth would not vote for pro-establishment parties at upcoming elections on June 24. Batur also reminded the anti-imperialist struggle of the Communist Youth during the 50th anniversary of the struggle of revolutionary patriots who had thrown the American troops from the 6th Fleet into the sea in İstanbul.
Communist actor Cansu Fırıncı talked from the TKP podium. “They say thinking should be free. True, thinking should be free. Science should be free. Art should be free. But freedom cannot prevail with empty words. One needs to choose their side for freedom,” he noted.
Calling on the intellectuals and artists to choose their side in favour of the working people, Fırıncı said, “This social order must change. We will change it!”, concluding that they have chosen their side, which is why they took to the streets on May 1.
Mustafa Tozkoparan addressed thousands in the name of metal workers. He said that the capitalists want the working class to surrender to exploitation, yet the workers gather at May 1 rallies for an egalitarian order without exploitation. Tozkoparan called on the workers to get organized at workplaces, factories, plazas and offices.
Following communist worker, youth and intellectual representatives, Kemal Okuyan, the General Secretary of the TKP, addressed thousands of communists. “May 1 is the will of the working class to change this order. Celebrating May 1 without standing against exploitation would be hypocritical. One cannot approve private education and health while celebrating May 1,” Okuyan said.
Following the initial speeches, thousands of members and friends of the TKP marched to the main meeting area, shouting slogans, “Long live May 1”, “Long live revolution and socialism”.
‘TKP RAISED THE GLORIOUS BANNER OF SOCIALISM’
After the meeting, Kemal Okuyan delivered a speech to the party cortege again. Stating that hundreds of thousands of labourers were celebrating May 1 around the country, Okuyan said that the TKP raised the glorious banner of socialism in many cities.
“Those who wanted to doom the people to a compromising and unassertive politics that lost its faith in socialism are mistaken,” Okuyan underlined, adding the TKP showed again that it could raise hopes in Turkey.
Indicating that May 1 is not a symbolic day within 365 days, Okuyan said that the TKP has always established a link between May Day and the struggle. Okuyan remarked that the communist party will not surrender to the capitalist representatives at elections although the electoral council unlawfully prevented the TKP from entering the elections with the party name. “We will be the voice of socialism on June 24,” he added.
Calling on the communists to work energetically for elections following May 1, Okuyan emphasized that the TKP will never surrender to the owners of this scoundrel order, nor to the pseudo-left in the service of the capitalist order. As Okuyan concluded his speech, he and communists chanted slogans, “Long live revolution and socialism”, “Long live the TKP”.
Chanting slogans, “Long live May 1”, various groups, left-wing parties and trade unions marched to the meeting area following the call of the Confederation of Progressive Trade Unions (DİSK), the Confederation of Public Employees Union (KESK), The Union of Chambers of Turkish Engineers and Architects (TMMOB) and the Turkish Medical Association (TTB).
Workers and participators were called for a moment of silence at the main meeting area for those who lost their lives in the struggle in the past. “The workers will stop Erdoğan, we are not choiceless,” said Arzu Çerkezoğlu, the General Secretary of the Progressive Trade Unions (DİSK).
