HDP and the death of politics

The Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) is gradually turning from a "medium for reconciliation and interaction" in the Kurdish question to a tool for "imposition and confrontation." It appears the task to carry to the public the declaration of the Democratic Society Congress (DTK), to defend and politicize it has been assumed by the HDP.

The declaration in question is based on the "demand for autonomy" and wants this to be discussed. Actually, there is no problem with this or up to this point. Autonomy is one of the methods to solve this problem, one of the means to meet the needs of Kurds, and the discussion-demand-decision relationship is critical in the democratic order.

However, since this demand has become the "prerequisite" to ending the violence, it begins to define violence as a legitimate tool and in fact as a value, and politics is suddenly replaced by imposition.

This is the big picture we have in front of us.

Hence, the declaration "claims armed self-rule announcements." It shows "the urban wars as a rightful and legitimate resistance" aimed at protecting these. It is calling the people, chiefly Kurds, to join this "resistance." It demands the state accept its demand for autonomy in order to end the violence.

This needs to be especially underlined:

The demand itself is not what is political or what indicates politics. It is also the way that demand is expressed and the legitimacy that arises from this.

Calling such a demand political under the shadow of weapons, violence and taking the people hostage, is only possible by turning it into a tool for war politics.

The path taken by the HDP is not surprising.

Hence the claim of Turkishness did not consist of the Turkish society's expectation for new action. It was also associated with the general strategy of the Kurdish political movement turning toward politics with the wave caused by the reconciliation process. Turkishness was a picture that was supported, yet it was fragile and known to be relative.

And it broke.

After the June elections, some developments in the area of Kurdish politics took place in front of our eyes. With the statements it wanted the public to hear in particular and its interviews, Qandil made the HDP election success relative. This reminded the political party that its place and control panel was not at the center of politics but center of arms.

HDP Co-Chair Selahattin Demirtaş seemed initially to resist a little; for instance he had said the "declaration for armed autonomy," which he defends today and gives deep meaning to, was wrong.

However, Qandil used the developments after June 20 to crush the relative autonomy of politics and Demirtaş. Demirtaş's dependent changing dose increased. He started to defend the merging of cantons in north Syria. He laid claim to the resistance, violence and declaration of autonomy. Its "Daesh equals the Justice and Development Party [AK Party]" equation, its rhetoric degrading the security measures against declarations of autonomy to the government's massacre policy, started to degrade the HDP to Qandil's "Head of Propaganda."

Hence today what we are discussing is not the Kurdish question but the method with which this problem will be solved.

Every "democrat" living in this country, whether leftist or rightist, know that such a problem exists and is aware of the desire and demand of Kurds to self-govern to an extent and under the condition of democratic integrity, and is defending and accepting that these desires need to be satisfied for reconciliation.

The matter that is not accepted and cannot be accepted is that these demands are being put forward through confrontation, impositions and violence. And at the point we have reached, the method, in other words the violence and problem has gone beyond the natural demands.

This is because the PKK has changed and increased its goal.

Hence, the problem rises from the PKK starting off as a player in the region and then feeling like a regional player.

In this context, the problem is associated with Qandil's claim soaring beyond Turkey's borders and including the Kurds in Syria.

The problem arises from the organization's ties between Turkey and Syria, the Kurdish regions in Turkey turning into cantons, turning into Syria, and its search to establish control through chaos.

The only path to progress this strategy which cannot be carried out with politics and consensus is violence and arms.

Demirtaş indicating to a common fate for Kurds in different countries, stating that the next century will be theirs, is not only the open expression of a political dream, but also the projection of this strategy.

We are at the point where the HDP is mediating the death of politics.

We hope this phase will be overcome and the system's smart political moves and new conditions will leave the Qandil strategy behind.