Harsh accusations from Kılıçdaroğlu: Your government betrayed the Republic of Turkey State

CHP General Chair Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu held the group meeting at the “Equality and Justice Women’s Meeting” staged at the Ankara Arena by the CHP Women’s Sections to mark the 83^rd anniversary of the granting to women of the right to vote and stand for election. Kılıçdaroğlu, who had harsh words in his speech for President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, said “You had knowledge of all the events from the outset. Nine months before 17/25 December, one of the esteemed institutions of this state appeared before you and presented a three-page briefing. You closed that case. Your government worked for Reza Zarrab. Your government betrayed the Republic of Turkey.”
 
“I condemn A Haber that made the Turkish flag into a backdrop for a fraudster”
 
Kılıçdaroğlu, also railing against the pool media, said, “The pool media brought this Reza Zarrab on television and placed the Turkish flag behind him. I violently condemn the pool media that places the Turkish flag as a backdrop behind a fraudster. I both condemn A Haber and A television. Then they post Tweets saying we should pin the medal of honour on him. Pin it on, will you, wherever you like. But, I know fine well what I will pin around your neck.”
 
The key points from Kılıçdaroğlu’s speech:
 
“Let nobody play with Jerusalem”
 
Jerusalem. Many of our young people from the 68 generation today lie beneath the Palestinian soil. They went there for Palestine’s independence. It is important for us that Palestine establishes a state. We send the greetings and respect of hundreds of thousands of women from this auditorium. We support your demand for a state and your demand for democracy. Let nobody play with Jerusalem. They are causing blood and tears once more in the Middle East. Let nobody prevent our support for them.
 
Women’s right to vote and stand for election
 
Today is 5 December. It has been 83 years since women were granted the right to vote and stand for election. In 1934, war hero Mustafa Kemal Atatürk and his friends granted this right through a law. With women in Turkey gaining the right to vote and stand for election in 1934, France granted this right ten years later, in 1944, and Italy, Argentina and Mexico did so in 1946. Greece granted it in 1952. The war hero Mustafa Kemal Atatürk knew full well that while men were fighting on the front, it was this country’s dauntless women who were bringing them munitions support, shells on their backs. Mustafa Kemal Atatürk granted this in 1934. Following the first congress, we introduced a 33% sexual quota. Was it enough? No. We must also incorporate this into the political parties’ law in parliament. I give my word before all women that my instruction to the Group Deputy Chairs in the coming days will be, “Submit an amendment to the political parties’ law incorporating a 33% sexual quota.” When we bring this before the General Assembly, we will let women know and we will see who votes in favour and who wants women to have less of a place in politics. You monitor it, too, and we will also be the monitors of it. Given that women want to make a productive contribution, they want politics. There is a party that offers all of this. Its name is the CHP. Come to the CHP. We have never inquired into your life style and will not do so. Whatever your beliefs and your faith, I await all women under the CHP’s roof.
 
“If you say “yes” to this order then I rebel against this”
 
It is this country’s women who are experiencing the pain of life most deeply. Women endure the greatest pain from the economic straits. Those whose baby dies of hunger, those who lose their child to the cold. Ayaz baby lost his life in Konya’s Ereğli. He lived in a single-room adobe house. Its windows were broken. Those who set up companies on the Isle of Man will not understand this mother’s drama. Mothers understand best. We have not forgotten the pain of the father who carried little Muharrem on his back for 16 kilometres in Van’s Gürpınar. Or Emine Akçay’s story. They lived in Adana and were poor. The report reads as follows: she went to the firewood seller with the last six lira in her pocket to get fuel. The firewood seller said, “That isn’t enough money to get anything” and gave ten kilos of firewood. She tried to burn the wood with bits of tyre because it was wet, but it wouldn’t burn. She switched on her hair drier and put in in her son’s hand and then went to the bedroom and hanged herself. What I have spoken of is Emine Akçay’s drama. What I have spoken of is not the drama of those who set up companies on the Isle of Man. It is the drama of the millions of women in Turkey who are hungry and are left without means of subsistence. I call out to you all: if you say “yes” to this order then I rebel against this. I rebel against the order that creates Emine Akçays. For, I come from the order of Bülent Ecevit and war hero Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. I want a humane and just order.
 
An order in which everyone can circulate freely. An order in which everyone’s life and property is assured. If you simply come crashing down on your citizens, this order is not a humane and just order. The heroes of this struggle will be this country’s women. You pay tax when you buy bread and you pay tax when you buy chewing gum for your kids. But, some people engage in all kinds of ruses to evade tax. As I just said, Emine Akçay pays tax to buy firewood, but those who set up companies on the Isle of Man to evade tax engage in all kinds of fraud. Am I not to call to account for this?
 
“You are non-national”
 
Whatever you buy you pay tax. But some people engage in ruses of all kinds. Emine Akçay pays tax to buy firewood, but those who set up companies on the Isle of Man to evade tax engage in all kinds of fraud. Am I not to call to account for this? But the well-off buy diamonds and there is no tax. But, think of the truck driver who spends twelve hours bumping away at the wheel. They sell the most expensive diesel in the world to you. What was it? They are supposedly national and local. If you set up a company to evade tax you are neither national nor local. You are non-national.
 
“We will bury them at the ballot box together with the women’s movement”
 
They cruise around in yachts with a whisky glass in their hand and decked out in expensive shorts, and they buy diesel and do not pay a cent in tax. You will call this to account in 2019. We will bury them at the ballot box together with the women’s movement. Think of someone on the minimum wage earning 1404 lira per month. They pay income tax, VAT, stamp duty and special consumption tax, but this Manx crowd set up fronts abroad. And they tell us not to get involved. I will get at them all. I will deprive them all of sleep at night. I will rouse this nation’s conscience into a fury.
 
“Why do funds to the tune of fifteen million dollars come to a one-pound company; why does this money go?”
 
Why do funds to the tune of fifteen million dollars come to a one-pound company; why does this money go? They say they have brought in fair taxation. There is no fairness in taxation. They still say the documents are false. My reply to them is very simple. Given that they are false, let us set up a commission in Parliament. You have the majority. You do not come and set it up. You, too, know that they are not false. You do not want your fraud to be displayed in front of Parliament. My word is my bond. I will pursue this to the end. This was supposedly company trade. Which company? No reply. What is its profit? No reply. Why is a one-pound company doing fifteen million dollars’ worth of trade? No reply. Who is Sıtkı Ayan? No reply.
 
Dear Erdoğan, my affection for you knows no bounds. Dear Erdoğan, take a doctor at your side. Does your brother-in-law Ziya İlgen have a company on the Isle of Man? I ask once more. Why would your brother-in-law set up a company? A quick-thinking member of parliament says the CHP General Chair’s home must be searched and documents seized. Out of fear. I invite Mr Külünk along with his lady wife to my home. You are most welcome to come. I know that my home is not as rich as his home. We do not have armchairs that are as rich as his, either. Let him come with his wife. Should he so wish, I will take him on a tour of my home. He can take any book he wishes but I wish him to be sure of one thing. In the name of God, there are no shoeboxes at my home. They have pronounced the documents to be false without even seeing them. Take a look, brother. You, too, know very well what fraud is. You have all the dodges? I am a former tax man. They pronounced the documents to be false without looking at them. Take a peep, will you? The same goes for his lawyer. Pick the documents up, will you? You, too, know fine well what fraud is. You have tricks of all kinds.
 
“I call out to my AK Party-voting brothers”
 
I call out to my AK Party-voting brothers. I have always respected your vote. Place your hand on your conscience and take a think. Is the Recep Tayyip Erdoğan you voted for in 2002 the Erdoğan in 2017? He lived in a modest flat in Keçiören. Erdoğan in 2017 is an Erdoğan who looks down on the nation that has succumbed to his conceit, speaks as he pleases, is rolling in wealth and cannot account to the nation for his wealth.
 
“Now, they have become obsessed with business people”
 
Now, they have become obsessed with business people. He says he is addressing his cabinet in the first instance. He gives an instruction to the Yıldırım government. He says that he must never give permission to employers to leave, because these people are betrayers of the country. That is, he is calling them traitors. They used to come to Turkey and now they are running away from Turkey. For, none of them has safety of life and property. If you want foreign capital to come to Turkey, you will free the entire nation, you will free journalists, you will furnish media freedom, you will furnish independence of the judiciary, you will not silence universities and you will bring all the academics whose posts you terminated back to the universities. You will immediately reinstate Semih and Nuriye in their posts.
 
You did not bring wellbeing to this country, brother. You speak and stoke up tension among the eighty million. What has come of the tension and dispute? He raises hell when a question is asked. You shout all you will, you will never, ever silence us. The state is to be governed with justice.
 
“You have brought the economy to ruin in the country”
 
Look at the state the economy has fallen into. Go to İnegöl, the capital of furniture. It is at a standstill. Who is to blame? He will say it is the CHP. It is true, you know - they cannot govern the country. You have brought the economy to ruin in the country. Go and ask the farmer, why don’t you, “How’s things?”
 
“They call him ‘interest-bearer Tayyip’"
 
What does the nation call Tayyip? Interest-bearer Tayyip. The interest he has paid the group abroad in fifteen years has been 145 million dollars. He speaks of not having taken loans from the IMF. True. You went and got it from usurers.  He cannot control inflation, either. They have another merry fellow named Bekir Bozdağ. Supposedly, the forces of darkness want Kılıçdaroğlu’s resignation. The government wants this, too. The forces of darkness and you have joined arm in arm and are working on the project as to how you can destroy Kılıçdaroğlu. Do what you like. Kılıçdaroğlu will defend this nation’s justice.
 
“Where did you spend this 20 billion dollars?”
 
I will ask one more thing: the money spent on Syrians. Where did you spend this 30 billion dollars? Recep Akdağ got up and replied. We made roads - do the Syrians not travel on them? May God grant some common sense. For Pete’s sake, roll out somebody with a bit of sense and let them give a proper reply. Their big brother spoke – Erdoğan. The figures he spoke of total 9.5 billion. So, where are the remaining 20 billion dollars? I am still lovingly asking you. Where did you spend this 20 billion dollars?
 
Let us come to Reza Zarrab. Yesterday he was a philanthropic businessman. He was a member of the state protocol. The President, Prime-Minister, ministers and Reza Zarab, with undersecretaries and directors in the rear seats. The pool media brought this Reza Zarrab on television and placed the Turkish flag behind him. I violently condemn the pool media that places the Turkish flag as a backdrop behind a fraudster. I both condemn A Haber and A television. Then they post Tweets saying we should pin the medal of honour on him. Pin it on, will you, wherever you like. But, I know fine well what I will pin around your neck. You are traitors. You cannot use the Turkish flag as the backdrop for a charlatan. The person who does so is a traitor. It did not stop at this, and they brought a bribe-giver and fraudster and sat him in a ministry and gave him plaques. On account of his supposed contributions to foreign trade.
 
“They whitewashed the bribe-taking ministers”
 
They whitewashed the bribe-taking ministers. They prevented them from going to the Grand Chamber. Who were these MPs. Hakkı Köylü, Yılmaz Tunç, Kemal Şerbetçioğlu, İlknur İnceöz, İsmet Su, Bilal Uçar, Mustafa Akış, Yusuf Başer and Ayşe Türkmenoğlu. I had said to them that they were bending over backwards for Reza Zarrab and all hell broke loose. You see better that I was right, don’t you? They released Zarrab. They also lifted the ban on him going abroad. What kind of approach to government is this? What kind of love for Reza Zarrab is this? He was arrested in America and our lot get into a flurry. They went to America but they do not hand the guy over. The Prime-Minister went, the Minister of Justice went, the Foreign Minister went. But they do not hand the guy over. What the Americans have done is also persecution. Then, America imprisons the man on whom the medal of honour was to be pinned. We presented diplomatic notes twice. I now call out to my AK Party-voting brothers’ consciences. A government that presents two diplomatic notes for a fraudster and a charlatan did not once present a note when sacks were placed over the heads of soldiers in Northern Iraq.
 
“Zarrab is a fraudster but he is also somebody who bought state secrets with money”
 
The man has finally started to speak. Zarrab is a fraudster but he is also somebody who bought state secrets with money. He is somebody who had ministers in his pocket. He is somebody ministers knelt before. Reza Zarrab speaks on the phone to Muammer Güler on 11 October 2013. Güler’s reply is, “The Interior Minister is a man firmly in office. Keep your cool about that. If there is such a thing, I’ll go out of my way for you.” Police intelligence testifies to that.
 
“With Reza Zarrab singing like a canary he ceased to be a patriot and became a traitor”
 
With Reza Zarrab singing like a canary, this time he became a spy, he became a traitor. You were together until yesterday. Just like FETO. You gave whatever they wanted. You gave Zarrab whatever he wanted. Istanbul Republic Chief Prosecution launched an investigation. A decision was taken to seize his assets on the grounds that he acquired the state’s information that required to remain secret for the purpose of espionage for the benefit of a foreign country. I had actually previously said that Reza Zarrab was a spy. Who gave Zarrab this information? Despite everything, Turkey is a respected country. Despite all the attrition, Turkey has respected institutions.
 
He read the briefing that appeared before Erdoğan nine months prior to 17-25 December
 
A briefing was placed before the Prime-Minister of the day, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on 18 April 2013. The subject was Reza Zarrab. It spoke of all the fraud that was being conducted. It said that the conclusion reached was that Reza Zarrab might be declared a banned person by the USA in view of the Iranian individual’s fund transfers despite the economic sanctions and this may have a negative impact on relations with the USA. Who said this? The intelligence agency. It said it nine months before 17-25 December. The trickery this fraudster conducted and the bribes he gave to ministers were placed before you. What did you do? You closed this case. He was in any case a spy, in any case a fraudster. Your ministers, that is your government, handed over this information. Your government betrayed the Republic of Turkey. I said it on a TV station on 27 February 2014. I raised it again on another TV station on 22 March 2014. At that time, prosecutors were blocking their ears, because at that time bribes were still being handed out. Now, Erdoğan is capable of saying that Reza Zarrab deceived him.
 
“Reza Zarrab never deceived you”
 
Reza Zarrab never deceived you. You had knowledge of all the events from the very outset. You lie saying he deceived you, because a briefing was placed before you nine months before 17-25 December. I call out to the prosecutors who conducted the investigation. You went in pursuit of the fraudster, you did so a bit late, and you had him acquitted. The first thing you will do is get rid of those judges and prosecutors who closed that investigation. And you will interrogate the ministers and government who handed over that information. I gave no information and I did not sit and speak. They have filed hundreds of suits against me whenever I speak. I have said that if you do not file one here you are yellow.
 
Call to Binali Yıldırım
 
Were they not the ones who opened the cosmic room to a terrorist organisation? Your ministers gave Reza Zarrab information of all kinds. Who was the Prime-Minister in this country? If someone sneezed you knew about it. We will call to account at the ballot box in 2019. We will do so with the strength of women.
 
I call out to Binali Yıldırım. It troubles my conscience for a trial involving Turkey to be held in America. Given that the prosecution has opened an investigation, come and let us get parliament moving. Let us clean this stain. Just as Iran did it, let us do so, too. Come and let us reopen the case. Let us solve this case, not the American judiciary. Let us clean up our own filth.
 
“DOCUMENTATION OF TREASON”
 
CHP member of parliament Eren Erdem posted the briefing sent by the intelligence agency, noting, “Documentation of treason. Mind you do not put on some kind of show about having been deceived. You did everything knowingly and willingly. You sold this fraudster, this odious man, state secrets. You betrayed the country by combining with a spy. You are all traitors. YOU WILL STAND TRIAL!”