For a long time now, there have been discussions about the future of the peasant’s movement in Bergama.  The peasants have accomplished a great deal.  Now, it is time for them to enter the political arena in a more organized fashion.  We have considered joining a political party but the peasants have traditional party loyalties.  Even if a political party has never supported them, they don’t abandon the political party supported by their fathers.  It’s important to respect their freedom. It would not be right to call on them to join a particular party.

What agricultural producers/peasants should so is join together under one roof in a union.  “Can the peasants do this?” People ask.  Of course they can.  In the same way that they have resisted the gold-mine, the peasants can leave their mark on history.  They can form a union, have a say in determining what they produce.

Other unions negotiate with employers.  Our employer is the state – it’s the state that markets our produce, that buys it, that determines policy as it sees fit.  Now, we plan to face the state with a union so we can say: “Wait a minute.  We have some ideas on what and how we should produce.  Listen to us.”  Until now, this was done only through co-ops such as TARIS, Cukobirlik and Antbirlik.  But those organizations had their own politics – whoever controlled them imposed his own political views.  The union of agricultural producers/peasants will emphasize the fundamental rights of the producer, and set up the infra-structure of a new kind of organized political movement in Turkey.  This should be taken very seriously.  The peasants of Thrace have an amazing degree of awareness.  It is now a year since they have formed a union but they haven’t been able to make their voices heard.

Now, we have to touch on a very important matter here; the matter of opposing state policies.  The state should evaluate opposition very carefully.  Instead of getting defensive, it should listen to citizen’s grievances.  Can’t governments make mistakes?  Can’t citizens intervene?  Why does our government always take our intervention as opposition? 

Agricultural producers/peasants have an important place in this country.  They have been neglected, silenced, marginalized.  They have not been organized.  And now, instead of  forcing them to migrate to squatter neighborhoods around big cities, instead of treating these patriotic, hard-working people as threats to the state, governments have to sit down with them, and to listen to them.  Peasants should not be forced to leave the land.  They should not be destroyed.  They should not be condemned to rot in squatters’ settlements. 

It is the citizens’ responsibility to intervene and to help the state in such matters, even if the state behaves in an anti-democratic fashion from time to time.   

All this is important and obvious.  But there’ll be no point in talking about these things ten years from now.  The results of the deception called globalization are already apparent in an increasing colonization of under-developed countries.  Now, we have to look for a place for ourselves in the “New World Order.”  This is such a democratic search.  Such a respectable search. 

Anatolian peasants are no longer supposed to plant their cotton, their hazel nuts and their sugar beets.  Quotas are beginning to be imposed on them.  In the world that is being shaped by the comditions imposed by the IMF and the WTO, peasants will received the hardest blows, suffer the greatest losses.  The infra-structure for this is ready.  The laws are being passed.

And that’s why it is more important than ever to prevent an irreversible erosion today; to prepare the infra-structure of a foundation that will uphold democratic principles, that will open the way for rights and freedoms.

What am I trying to say?  That the dominant political views will change one day.  But the process of change -- even a change favourable to the people, will cause great difficulties for the people. The people have always suffered the most, made the greatest sacrifices, paid the highest prices.  We want this to be different.  Many people in many groups want it to be different but perhaps they lack the courage to speak up.  Perhaps the peasants of Bergama are more experienced, more courageous.

The union of agricultural producers/peasants will be a democratic organization that will unite us under one umbrella, and that will express our views to governments, that will intervene against governments’ incorrect policies.  We’ll be able to say: “Please listen to us.  We don’t approve of your choices, people who represent us have not been able to defend our rights, they have disappeared in a web of crooked relationships, but we haven’t disappeared. An entire history, an entire generation, a culture hasn’t disappeared.  We are here.”

The people who come to the countryside from the cities and who admire the fresh tomatoes on the branches, who greet the cotton producers, who pick hazelnuts from the trees; who see the calloused hands of our tea-pickers and who admire the beauty and freshness of local produce have to support our struggle.  We cannot survive in large cities.  There, squatter districts swallow people.  They present dangers for us. For our young girls.  For our young men.

It’s a dog-eat-dog world.  But look: industrialists are speaking up, unions are speaking up, instructors are speaking up.  The parliament seems totally indifferent.  We are passing through an unhealthy period.  Is it not the citizens’ duty to speak up at such times?  No matter how old we are, if, one day, there’s a knock at our door and we are given a responsibility, we should be up for it.  

This has happened in the past.  The country was invaded from all sides as it is now.  Today, we are invaded by economic forces that impose conditions on us.  Our state, our government may be well meaning but they are not able to stand up to these forces.  We should not give up on democracy.  There can be no half-measures in democracy. 

And so, I feel the time has come to prepare an inheritance for our children:  a democratic structure that will allow the voices of the peasants who make up 70% of the population of this country, to be heard.  A union that will allow them to have a say in shaping their future.

Turkey has experienced a process of resistance to a gold-mine.  At one corner of the country, an the most unexpected moment, people have said” “This is my life.  I live here.  I want to have a say in what happens here.”  They did this with dignity, without violence, without falling for provocation.  Even if these people do not know how to read and write, if they have learnt to stand up for themselves, to behave as citizens, these people should not be left defeated in the face of imperialism. 

Now, authorities should understand how, after struggling all those years and winning the admiration of people all over the world, the hearts of these people will break when they walk past the barbed wire fence of the mine, fifty kilometers from their homes.  The authorities will live with the shame of having done this tot them, for a handful of money.

A day will come when the world will judge such shameful conduct. 

We don’t want much.  We want our independence, as always. We don’t want people to die.  We want to be able to educate our children, we want health-care.  And we want democracy for everyone.  It is not so hard to give us these things.

The peasants of Bergama are giving a message to the authorities.  This message should not offend anyone.  We are saying: “You have failed to govern this country properly.  You have injured people’s dignity.  And you are doing dangerous things. Lift your heads and look at us.  We do not approve of what you are doing.  You may think that you are solving problems by using force, by sending people to prisons, but one day you may find before you the thousands, the millions of people who once defeated the foreign invaders ofthis country.  You may be already hearing their footsteps of people who want only their lands and peace – the footsteps that herald the future.  Listen to them.

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