Yeni Yaşam Newspaper, which published yesterday the interview with HDP's former co-chairman Selahattin Demirtaş imprisoned in Edirne Prison, continued the interviews series with Figen Yüksekdağ imprisoned in Kandira Prison today, who is the other former co-chairman of the party. 

 

Answering questions about the current political situation in Turkey and in the Middle-East, Yüksekdağ told that in the regional and in the global scope, the structure of power comes to such a point that these structure is obliged to be changed this way or that way, while in Turkey it is now th opposition's turn to make a move and a principled alliance in the opposition side  could bring the end of AKP-Palace government.

 

Yüksekdağ answered the questions as follows:

 

Can you tell us about the circumstances and your work in prison?

 

I try to produce the life as one of the many who are exposed to problems in general in isolation and in prisons. Being one of the imprisoned politicians whom the government targets, also causes me to encounter some special treatments like my other imprisoned politician friends. Investigations, penalties, arbitrary oppressions and approaches aimed to provoke and specifically target us, have increased and intensified in Kandira Prison.

 

Our channels to access to information and news are also blocked. For example, we have not been able to receive your newspaper for more than a year. Other newspapers, magazines and books are not delivered to us due to special ban decisions as well.

 

I also think that we have succeeded to create a solidarity and qualitative change among the imprisoned women here, which are put on test under these difficult conditions. Of course, we have not yet completed the stage that could reveal our potential in all its aspects and that would respond to expectations at a higher level. However, I can say that our prison process has become an indicator of our process of maintaining the significant level reached by the democratic politics and women's struggle for freedom.

 

How are your days passing by? How is your health?

 

My days are busy and fast. There is no major problem in my health. There is a prison-aphorism that reads: "In prison, days pass fast and years pass slowly". I guess our years in prison have passed as fast as our days. Of course, being fast does not mean being easy. However, the country had 3 difficult years together with us. What matters is to improve the ability to cope with difficulties. In this regard, I can say that the stand maintained inside and outside have created a resistance barrier against fascist attacks which have never took a break.

 

What is your anticipation of the political situation in 2020, what kind of turn do you expect?

 

In the previous period we left behind, the moves of the AKP-Palace government had determined the trend. On the other, we can say for today that the initiative to make moves have shifted to the opposition side. The opposition plays a role that reveals the possibilities for a change. In fact, a movement of change that covered the majority of society had been felt for some time now.  Now an attitude has emerged which is inclined to develop a  political cooperation against the AKP-Palace-MHP front. Although this has not yet come to the point of establishing an advantage of move, it has come to a cross-road to overcome the passive and static mode of the previous period.

 

In the current state, the need for the political moves of the democratic opposition that could make leaps in a matter that is rather more decisive, courageous and direct line of progressive development of the became more evident. The 2020 period cannot be evaluated independent from this need.

 

How should we evaluate the AKP's mega project preference?

 

AKP supported the deepening of the political crisis that results in the people’s and the laborers’ turning into the victims of an increasingly growing economic crisis in order not to risk the continuity of the benefit agreements and the massive exploitation-profit wheel AKP created. To the point reached today, everyone, except AKP-Palace government and a handful of capitalists, are unable to see their future. The economy completely based on consumption and construction business has collapsed more than once, and their so-called solutions are always via the speculative games of capital, relying on the taxes taken from the public and natural resources. However, everybody sees that it is only the bourgeois of AKP and the marginal rich club who are AKP’s collaborators.

 

AKP and Erdogan are trying to extend their lifetime nder the title of mega projects such as Canal Istanbul that are of no use for the society, on the contrary  which will only deepen the plunder, the ecological destruction and the social divisions. 

 

The government has dived into Libya after Syria, what would this bring for Turkey? 

 

The government has changed its direction towards the war in Libya. Government is not able to survive without the wars, either in the center of it or being in contact with it. Now this has turned into a method of breathing for the dominant structure, which has no use other than producing insolvency in the midst of these deep crises. In other words, the policy of war only works for the AKP-Palace government and its small partner MHP.  Financing their benefits are on the shoulders of the masses of workers and laborers, of people and of women. The discontent or the reactions developed in the process of Rojava have made the war-card of the government ineffective. Now in the case of Libya, these reactions has turned out to be rather clearer and direct objections.

 

The system opposition plays the dominant role in the opposition side and strengthens AKP’s anti-Kurdish and war-oriented policy, is also responsible for the growing swamp, for the great risks and crises that derive from that swamp in the region and primarily in Syria. Our hope is that the rightful attitude towards sending troops to Libya would turn into a defense of peace and solution that is of a consistent and fair manner. 

 

What kind of s struggle agenda should the opposition follow? 

 

As we often say, the area needs to be expanded that would supply the ground for a democratic alliance with a more solid understanding. There is a need for a new mode that could fit the requirements of the democratic alliance policy, not of the AKP-Palace government. The vein leading to hearth of this is to turn the understanding of democratic alliance into a center of attraction. Because it is the only way to be able to survive outside the AKP-Saray-MHP government.

 

A new government option can also be built on such a clear perspective. It can be through an alternative program that reaches from a democratic constitution to a bottom-supported, participatory governing model. The most important of all is to make the policy of this alternative governing within the struggle of life together with the people’s movements and organizations. What it takes to improve the consciousness of self-governance of the society is to give the form and the soul to the alternative governance alternative.  The key and decisive role of HDP to create an alternative government has already been solidified. 

 

Figen Yüksekdağ, calling for everyone to take part in the upcoming HDP congress answered the question on the HDP congress as follows:

 

Our congress will be a new threshold that the claim of overcoming the fascism and establishing a democratic power of our people would rise and test itself. Even going to the congress by walking in the middle of great difficulties and impossibilities is a sign of the political determination that HDP insists on. 

 

It is our only wish that our peoples and all democracy forces embrace their party, their hope and their future. Everyone should take responsibility and work with higher motivation and energy to manage their duty. We should be aware of the fact that we can earn more than we have lost. We cannot let any shade to fall on our spirit of victory, faith, and winning together. The spirit of victory is already there, in our experience and it is still young and fresh in our never-ending strength to resist which we will never ever let go. I believe that the process of HDP congress will reveal the hope and courage in the people's heart in a brighter form and will record a more undefeatable party-truth.

 

What would you like to say about women's struggle in the coming period?

 

It will be a critical time in terms of defending the rights gained at the end of long and difficult struggles. Not coming close to eliminating the deficiencies in the laws preventing child marriages or subsistence money, we are in such a period that we should fight for these basic rights to be legitimized. Besides the fascists attacks in general, women's achievements and equal representation mechanisms are targeted in specific. The only way to defend the civic and political rights attained is women's awareness and organization passes through a more determined and united struggle. The strength of women's unity line determines the level of success of the struggle.