BURCU KARAKAŞ

Following the 3-year and 9-month prison sentence given to Van Metropolitan Municipality Co-Mayor Abdullah Zeydan, another DEM Party municipality was appointed a trustee. Diyarbakır Metropolitan Municipality also faced two trustee appointments in 2016 and 2019. We spoke to Serra Bucak, Co-Mayor of Diyarbakır Metropolitan Municipality, about the social and political consequences of the trusteeship practices after Zeydan was sentenced to prison. Regarding the trustee appointments, Bucak said, ‘Even though the government persistently and stubbornly does not learn lessons from undemocratic methods, the people have always said and will say, 'No matter what you do, we are on the side of the just struggle.' The government must now digest and accept the will of the people and give up these anti-democratic practices."