Football Fans and Unionists Booed Prime Minister

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was protested with booing at a demonstration on Istiklal Avenue in Beyoğlu (central Istanbul). The protest came just a few days after Erdoğan had been booed at the opening ceremony of the Galatasaray Football Club's new Stadium on 15 January. He left the stadium without having given his speech and said later on, "This should not be the answer to my kindness". About 3,000 people demonstrated by booing and chanting slogans and showing red cards.

The protesters walked from the centrally located Taksim Square until Galatasaray Square on Saturday (22 January). They shouted slogans such as: "Resign Tayyip Erdoğan", "Tayyip take the stadium and crush it on your head", "Long live the colours' brotherhood", "Side by side against fascism".

A banner read, "Also in sports, we will not surrender, we will not be silent or duck out", and other banners featured Erdoğan dressed up as a sultan reading, "Nobody is a king or sultan" and "The Public is greater than you".

Police intervention against protestors

When the crowd reached the Galatasaray Square, they encountered an armed combat car and about 50 policemen in heavily shielded apparel. They were standing in a line so that further access to the Galatasaray Square was blocked. Additional, a broad number of civil security officers followed the demonstrators on their way down Istiklal Avenue.

Kurt: "The Stadium is not the property of anybody"

Metin Kurt, Leader of the Turkish Revolutionary Sports Workers Union (Spor Emek-Sen), read out a press release. He said that the Prime Minister tried to turn the opening ceremony of the new stadium into a political show. He continued that Erdoğan exhibited a shameful attitude when the crowd in the stadium did not put up with that. "The attitude of the political power and their supporters against the smallest non-violent democratic reaction in fact shows very clearly what kind of country and society they want", he argued.

Kurt emphasized that the new stadium was built with the money of the people and that the mortar was mixed with the workers' sweat and blood. He commemorated the workers who lost their lives in the course of construction. "This stadium was built with the money of the people and was created with the efforts and sweat of the workers; this is not the property of anybody in particular".

Unionist and Fenerbahçe supporters joined protest

The demonstration was also supported by fan groups of other football clubs and representatives and workers of various unions such as fan groups from the Galatasarary football club, Beşiktaş and Fenerbahçe, Instanbul representatives from Confederation of Progressive Trade Unions (DİSK) and the Turkish Confederation of Labour Unions (Türk-İş), UPS workers and the Chairman of the Turkish Communist Party (TKP).

Erdoğan was booed at the opening ceremony of the new Galatasaray stadium in Istanbul on the evening of 15 January. The Şişli (Istanbul) Prosecution now tries to identify thousands of fans who allegedly booed the Prime Minister. The head of the Galatasaray Sportsclub, Adnan Polat, mentioned that the footage of the night was not given to the police forces. (EG/VK)