From Turkey in solidarity

They say the world’s a small place, and this proves it. Who would have thought that in faraway Turkey, a group of young people with no connection to Fiji would have been interested in democracy here.

Intelligentsiya and the Fiji Freedom Bloggers received an email from a youth group in Turkey who called a press conference on a dockside in Istanbul, before getting on a boat and sailing out to simulate travelling to Fiji. Two of the youths delivered a speech in Turkish and English calling for the return to democracy.

The press conference organized by the Young Civilians on Saturday was filmed and the video posted to Youtube. It was touching to see a group of young people we don't even know with Fiji flags waving in the wind and posters of Bainimarama with the word "RESIGN" across it.

Granted some of the details in the speech are a bit inaccurate, but the spirit of the message remains.

In the email Neslihan, a member of the Young Civilians, explained how they’re experiencing similar problems in Turkey with their military trying to force its way into public life and threatening a coup.

The event came on the eve of elections in Turkey which was held on Sunday and won by the AK Party) in Turkey when reporting on election was banned. These people came up with a novel way to get around that, as Neslihan explains in the email:

“The event was that we read the text about coup detat of fiji both in turkish and in english at a coast of istanbul in front of a ship. after reading the statement we imitated that we got the ship to go to fiji. we left the coast by the ship at the end. it was quite nice. there were some journalists and tv cameras. one of them already wrote about the event now. and we think there will be more writings about it tomorrow. because tomorrow will be the election here and any news about the political parties and election is forbidden, so they will look for some alternatives. our protest of bainimarama coup will be that kind of alternative.

the thing is that we were talking about military pressure on people or interventions into civilian politics and parliament in fiji, but if you change the names and some details it was totally the story of our country, turkey. so, it s obviously meaningful to talk about your country here. when we are talking about turkey, people here tend to say that the army should intervene into politics if it s necessary(!) but when we are talking another country like fiji they are totally surprised and smile while saying that "wow what a funny politics". we know things are not funny. and we also know we are doing the right thing by standing against all kind of militarist solutions into politics.”

The video is posted here. The English version of the speech begins at 3:09.

Thank you to Neslihan and the gang at Young Civilians for your solidarity.