Nationalist Complaint Against Public Survey

A nationalist organization taking its name from the founder of the Republic Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, Kemalist Thought Association (ADD) Diyarbakır branch filed a complaint against Milliyet daily which published the results of a public opinion survey.

The survey titled "Who are we" aimed at establishing the allocation of ethnic, religious and ideological identities among Turkish people and people's reaction recent trends in society.

ADD branch chair Dr. Rıza Gül claimed the publication of the survey's results causes "hatred and hostilities among people".

He urged that the responsible editors of the daily would be tried with article 216/1 of the new Penal Code.

Gül argued that the introduction to the series of articles in the daily was written with the intention to "divide people on basis of ethnic roots".

Survey's results

Between March 19 and 23, Milliyet daily published several articles derived from the results of a survey conducted by KONDA research center.

Articles had titles such as "Half the poorest live in the Southeast" or "Number of people who identify themselves as Alevites are 4,5 million".

The newspaper stated that the research aimed at "establishing objectively and in a scientific manner the true nature of the modern Turkish society". A total of 48 thousand people have been surveyed for the research.

It concluded that Turkish people are not hesitant to express their ethnic identities. 55 million said they are ethnically Turks while 11,5 million said they are Kurds.

Also the research showed that the level of education as well as income decreases as one go south and eastern parts of the country. In return family population increased.

When asked to choose an identity, 59 percent defined themselves as "from Turkey", 42 percent put forward religious identities and 14 percent expressed ethnic identities first and foremost.(EÖ/TK/EÜ)