* Photo: METU students
Click to read the article in Turkish
The students of Middle East Technical University (METU) in the capital city of Ankara have started keeping watch near the stairs at their campus which they painted in rainbow colors for three times before, but were painted over in different colors by the METU administration.
The last time when the students painted the stairs was on April 21. On the same day, they also put up tents and started spending the night there.
MERDİVEN NÖBETİ - GÜN 1
— Tuna (@tunahangozlugol) April 21, 2021
Çadırlarımızı kurduk. Hava beklediğimizden soğuk. Isınmanın çeşitli yollarını bulduk. Derslerimizi çalışıyoruz ve çok güzel sohbetimiz var. Ne dersimizden ne sohbetimizden ne de direnişinden geri kalmıyoruz. Sevgi ve dirençle...
"WATCH FOR STAIRS - DAY 1: "We have set up our tents. The weather is colder than we exptected. We have found various ways to get warm. We are studying and having a nice chat. We keep up with our classes, our chat and our resistance. With love and resistance..."
On the fifth day of the watch yesterday, students announced that the Rectorate did not have the stairs painted in gray or any other color.
Kayyum yönetim bugün de merdivenleri boyamadı. pic.twitter.com/I71pHyZ44d
— Merdivenler Boyandı Mı? (@kayyumboyadimi) April 25, 2021
What happened?
The students of Middle East Technical University (METU) in Turkey's capital city of Ankara objected to the de facto ban imposed on rainbow flags at the campus of Boğaziçi University in İstanbul.
Students, with this objection in mind, colored the stairs at their campus on March 28. Then, the METU administration painted them in gray. Students colored them back in colors. This time, the Rector's Office used red and white colors, which it defined as "the colors of METU".
But the METU students "insisted" on rainbow colors and helped the stairs at their campus "reunite with their colors" one more time.
Similar to what has been happening in Boğaziçi for nearly 4 months, a struggle began against the appointed rector of METU.
On April 21, the students of the university who painted the stairs at the METU campus with the slogan "Everywhere is Boğaziçi, everywhere is resistance" were informed that an investigation would be launched against them over their protests from a week ago.
In an email sent from the Rector's Office of Prof. Verşan Kök, who is also an appointed rector, the students were told that "the freedom of painting anywhere they like at the university campus or doing whatever they want in campus life without getting a permission cannot be considered a freedom to be enjoyed by a certain group of students among 26 thousand students." (DŞ/SD)
