Boğaziçi students in Kadıköy: 'Release our friends from detention'
* Photo by Dilek Şen - bianet
Click to read the article in Turkish
After the İstanbul Governor's Office banned meetings, demonstrations and marches in Beşiktaş and Sarıyer districts amid Boğaziçi University students' calls for protest today at 2 p.m., the Boğaziçi Solidarity changed the date and place of the protest against the appointed trustee.
In a message shared on Twitter, the solidarity called on "all artists, academics, MPs and friends from other universities to come to Kadıköy Rıhtım at 4 p.m. to raise the struggle" together with them.
From Beşiktaş to Kadıköy
After protesting the university president in front of his office and chanting the slogans "University president, resign" at the South Campus today, the students marched from the campus to Beşiktaş.
Öğrenciler tüm engellemeleri aşarak Bebek kapısından çıkış yaptı. Yürüyerek Beşiktaş'a ilerliyorlar, oradan da Kadıköy'e vapurla varış yapacaklar.
— Kadıköy Dayanışma Ağı (@dayanismaagii) January 6, 2021
Herkesi 16:00 da Kadıköy'e bekliyorlar. #BogaziciUniversity #BoğaziciDireniyor pic.twitter.com/7rGDr7aCKk
While students were walking in groups, people in their cars expressed their support for the students by applauding them and sounding the horns of their cars. Students reached Beşiktaş district, chanting the slogan, "There is no salvation alone; either all together, or none of us."
Students crossed the Marmara Sea to go from Beşiktaş to Kadıköy.
Police in Kadıköy
Police took some measures in Kadıköy, where the students had previously announced that they would hold their protest.
Students have reached Kadıköy.
Hundreds of students are calling on Prof. Melih Bulu to resign.
In the hands of students, there are banners that read, "Universities belong to us, they will be free with us". Their banners also raise concerns about some detained students' accounts that they were subjected to strip search in detention. The banners read, "Yıldız and Havin are not alone" and "There are 37 detained, there is strip search in detention."
Students are also playing Metallica songs in reference to Bulu's remarks, "I am a university president who listens Metallica."
'Boğaziçi is not only about Boğaziçi'
Students have also made a statement for the press. Referring to what Prof. Bulu said on a live TV program on HaberTürk yesterday, they have said, "Contrary to what Prof. Dr. Melih Bulu said, we do not represent a minority of Boğaziçi University, we represent the very university.
"We, as the constitutents of Boğaziçi Univeristy, are against the appointment of trustee university president. We know that the trustee policies will affect all of us badly. We will not get used to it, we will not accept it.
"This needs to be known that Boğaziçi is not solely about Boğaziçi. We are also here to express the demands of women and all other LGBTI+s who say that İstanbul Convention must be enforced; we are here to express the demands of Bimeks workers resisting in front of Boğaziçi University and to express the demands of all laborers and the oppressed."
Students have reiterated their demand that their detained friends be released, chanting the slogan, "Strip search is sexual violence."
#BogaziciUniversity students are protesting in İstanbul’s Kadıköy, chanting the slogan, “Strip search is sexual violence” https://t.co/p6IqZuWWyy pic.twitter.com/TcCrDiwohq
— bianet English (@bianet_eng) January 6, 2021
What happened?
Prof. Melih Bulu has been appointed as the President of Boğaziçi University in a Presidential Decree issued on January 1. The appointment of Bulu has sparked harsh criticisms among both the students and academics of the university as well as in the academic community.
Appointed to Boğaziçi, one of the most prestigious universities in Turkey, from outside its community, Bulu was a candidate for nomination to run in the Parliamentary elections in 2015 for the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), which is chaired by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
The students and several students' clubs of the university have been campaigning on social media under the hashtag #kayyımrektöristemiyoruz (We don't want a trustee university president).
The call of the students was also supported by the faculty members of the university, who released a joint statement on January 3.
"An academic outside Bogazici University community was appointed as rector (university president), which is a practice introduced for the first time after the 1980s military tutelage," read their statement.
Amid harsh criticisms of students and faculty members, Prof. Bulu has shared a message on his Twitter account, welcoming his appointment to the position, saying, "We are all in the same boat."
The students protested the appointment of Bulu in front of the South Campus of the university in İstanbul on January 4. However, the police intervened into the protest with pepper gas and plastic bullets.
Next day, it was reported that there were detention warrants against 28 people for "violating the law on meetings and demonstrations" and "resisting the officer on duty." Later in the day, 22 of them were detained.
As of 1.30 p.m. on January 6, 36 people were in detention.
After the İstanbul Governor's Office banned meetings, demonstrations and marches in Beşiktaş and Sarıyer districts amid students' calls for protest, the Boğaziçi Solidarity changed the date and place of the protest, calling on people to come to Kadıköy at 4 p.m. on January 6.
About Melih Bulu
Prof. Melih Bulu was appointed as the President of Haliç University on January 17, 2020. In office in this foundation university for less than a year, he has been appointed as the President of Boğaziçi University.
He was a Dean and University President at the İstinye University from 2016 to 2019. Between the years of 2010 and 2016, he was the Head of the Business Management Department of İstanbul Şehir University's Business Management and Management Science Faculty.
He was the General Coordinator of International Competitiveness Research Institute (URAK), an NGO working on economic competitiveness of cities and countries, from the year 2017 to 2019. Since 2011, he has been the Executive Board member of the İstanbul Electric-Electronic Machinery and Informatics Exporters R&D Market.
In 2002, he founded the Sarıyer District Organization of the ruling AKP in İstanbul. In 2015, he was a candidate for nomination to run in the Parliamentary elections from the AKP in the first election district in İstanbul.
He studied Industrial Engineering at the Middle East Technical University (METU) in Ankara in 1992. He did his MBA and PhD at Boğaziçi University's Department of Management. (DŞ/SO/SD)