KEBABBLE Tequila and Turkish
nationalism By Fazile Zahir
FETHIYE, Turkey - All over Turkey, on
April 23, proud parents gazed adoringly as their
children leapt, sang and danced in celebration of
National Sovereignty Day and National Children's
Day. The public holiday for the whole country was
established by the country's founding father,
Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, as a reminder to boys and
girls that they are the future of the new
republic.
It was a remarkable gesture by a
man who had no children himself but adopted eight
and reflected the love and deep esteem he had for
children. Most kids are hugely grateful because
not only do they get a day off school but adults
must to be nice to
them and presents are par
for the course.
In most towns, the city
council and schools organize a day of festivities.
It is usual that older children are corralled into
a rudimentary marching band and blow and bang
their way along main boulevards with ample
enthusiasm if not musical talent. The nursery
classes get to wear fancy dress and all age groups
wave flags, perform folk dances and join in
athletic displays at local sports stadiums.
Children are also chosen to replace the state's
highest political personages for the day and even
the president and prime minister literally give up
their seats to a younger charge.
Parliament is convened with child "MPs"
and they hold a special session to discuss
children's issues. The child premier and president
are then mandated to sign off on executive orders
on what are mainly educational and environmental
policies.
For most parents it is an annual
opportunity to revel in the accomplishments of
their child's school and in the adorable behavior
of the little ones. For others, however, the day
is much more disquieting.
The date itself
is telling: April 23, 1920, was the day that the
Grand National Assembly met in Ankara as Ataturk's
forces were still fighting the Allied invasion in
their efforts to establish an independent country.
The date marked the establishment (at least in the
minds of the Turkish forces) of the independence
and sovereignty of their state. To simultaneously
dedicate this momentous day to the nation's youth
was how Ataturk chose to hand down his mandate
that their future role was the continued
protection of this sovereignty.
"The most
important thing is to teach our children and
youths to maintain Turkish liberty and their own
will and struggle with the enemies who attack our
national traditions," Ataturk said in 1922. Every
year this message is hammered home in an unsubtle
manner. For any parent, perhaps Armenian or
Kurdish, with doubts about the manner in which the
nation was forged, the validity of its current
boundaries and even of the jingoistic effect on
their children's ethnically Turkish classmates,
the florid celebration of Turkish nationalism may
be unwelcome.
The army marks the day by
reminding citizens that it is Children's Day and
National Sovereignty Day. This year they produced
three posters, the first shows Ataturk on the
background of a Turkish flag with the slogan "The
common ground of both independence and equality is
the sovereignty of the state" (their
emphasis) and has a small child inserted almost as
an afterthought into the bottom right corner of
the poster.
The second is less patriotic
and has a picture of children and the globe and
simply wishes all children everywhere a happy
holiday. But the third returns to the theme of
Ataturk's legacy and features a picture of the
great man in parliament with some children hugging
each other with the strapline "Happy Sovereignty
and Children's Day to Turkey's modern and
enlightened children".
One can only assume
that the choice of the words "modern and
enlightened" is not intended to encompass those
young daughters of the nation who choose to cover
their heads.
The indoctrination of
nationalism is not just limited to Children's Day.
Every Turkish school child must every day repeat
an oath of fealty to the Turkish state, normally
en masse in a playground before a statue of
Ataturk. Ziya Selcuk, university professor and
former head of the government's Training and
Education Board says, "In newly founded nation
states like ours education is an effective
political lever to train and transform people ...
but in recent decades this concept, which needs to
be loosened, continues."
Batuhan Aydagul,
deputy coordinator of the Education Reform
Initiative elaborates, "There's still some
emphasis on militarism, the importance of being
martyred, the importance of going to war, dying in
war and so on." It is a common concern amongst
pro-reform teachers that children are not
encouraged to give opinions opposed to established
ideas and the idea of criticizing Ataturk risks
attracting the attention of public prosecutors.
In its latest progress report, the
European Union also criticized education
materials, citing the negative portrayal of
minorities such as Armenians, and said further
work was needed to remove discriminatory language
from textbooks. Turkey is still involved in a long
process to join the EU.
But there are
innocent motives as well in Children's Day and for
the past 25 years Turkey has been working hard to
globalize the event. Large numbers of foreign
children are sent to participate in the
celebrations. They stay with host families, giving
each side the chance to learn about other
cultures, and the visitors join in the special
kids parliamentary session giving it a unique
international flavor.
Two of this year's
international participants raised eyebrows in
their formal meeting with the Prime Minister Recep
Tayyip Erdogan. The child from Palestine, Riyad
Jabarin, was the first. He invited the whole
Turkish parliament to come to Mecca and pray for
peace for Palestinian children and the press was
quick to note that Erdogan chatted to him in
Arabic. The other was the Mexican participant who
presented Turkey's teetotaller premier with a big
bottle of tequila.
The United Nations
Children's Fund, moved by the example of global
brotherhood, has also designated April 23 as
International Children's Day. In Turkey, neither
celebration, Sovereignty or Children's Day, is
likely to be ignored or dropped any time soon, but
perhaps future generations can look forward to a
time when they are not so tightly intertwined.
Fazile Zahir is of
Turkish descent, born and brought up in London.
She moved to live in Turkey in 2005 and has been
writing full time since then.
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