Sezai Temelli, the newly elected co-chair of the Pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), has overtly given the green light to a new "solution process" between his party and the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP).
The "solution process", which was initiated by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's AKP government and the Kurdish politicians with the aim of allegedly resolving the longstanding Kurdish issue, fully collapsed in 2015 when the parties could not agree on further proceedings behind closed doors.
On February 14, Pervin Buldan, another co-chair of the HDP, left the door open to a possible alliance between HDP and AKP.
HDP CO-CHAIR TEMELLİ: "WE NEED TO TAKE STEPS FOR THE SOLUTION"
Although the HDP leader blamed the AKP government for being authoritarian, in an interview with a local media outlet, he made such statements that leave the door open to negotiations with the AKP party. In answer to the question "whether your evaluation 'the government feeding on the Kurdish question' is also applicable to the 'solution process' ", the HDP co-chief said:
"The solution process was to dissolve this perception of the government. The government never had a sincere approach to all the sincere and self-sacrificing steps during the solution process which began in 2011 and became fairly evident between 2013 and 2015. It positioned itself not for the solution but for the sustainability of the Kurdish question."
Leaving the door open to a new "solution process", however, HDP co-chair Temelli continued: "If we are to mention a solution process today, we need to create a more realistic, permanent and sound mechanism of a solution by taking account of new dynamics in light of all these information. We need to take steps for the solution."
The HDP leader answered a question whether it is possible to return to the solution process again: "Yes. Indeed, we all expect the solution. We have never lost and never will lose our hopes. But this will be launched from a common point of entire social dynamics and social opposition. In other words, the struggle for democracy and peace would dissolve this aggressiveness of the government and this perception management."
TEMELLİ SUPPORTED AKP GOVT’S CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS IN 2010
Sezai Temelli and his co-chair Pervin Buldan were elected as the HDP party’s new leaders on February 11 in substitution for co-chiefs incumbent Serpil Kemalbey and jailed Selahattin Demirtaş who is accused of links to armed Kurdish PKK militants.
Temelli, an economics professor dismissed from İstanbul University by an emergency decree law, is criticized for his participation in the "Not enough, but yes!" campaign which catalysed the AKP-Gülen-liberal trio alliance’s win over the critical constitutional referendum in September 2010.
As the liberal intelligentsia advocated for the 'yes' campaign during the referendum process under the mask of "democratic reforms", the Peace and Democracy Party, the predecessor party to the HDP, boycotted the referendum, which resulted in a weakened 'no' front in favour of the AKP government.
Meanwhile, Prof Zeki Kılıçaslan from the parliamentary main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) talked to CNN Türk and said, "If required, if it is in favour of the people and nation, an alliance can be built with the HDP," adding that his party distinguishes terror from the Kurdish question.
