7 Kurdish Parties Form Alliance for Local Elections

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Seven Kurdistani political movements, associations and parties have released a joint declaration and announced that they have formed an alliance for the local elections on March 31, 2019.

The political entities partaking in the alliance are as follows:

Kurdistan Islamic Movement (AZADÎ), Democratic Regions Party (DBP), Revolutionary Democratic Kurdish Association (DDKD), Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), Human and Freedom Party (PİA), Partîya Komunîsta Kurdistan (KKP), Platforma Demokrata Kurdistan (PDK) and Partîya Demokrata Kurdistanê -Türkiye (PDK-T).

These parties will enter the local elections under the umbrella of HDP.

"I call our people to close ranks around this alliance"

HDP's former Co-Chair Selahattin Demirtaş has sent a message from Edirne Prison regarding the alliance of the Kurdish parties:

"I congratulate all my friends who have contributed to this work, which I believe will lay the ground for stronger and more successful alliances, and, with the belief that this alliance will be beneficial, I am making a call to our whole people, young and old alike, to close ranks around this alliance."

Reasons of the alliance

Releasing a joint declaration, the groups party to the declaration have expressed their reasons for forming the alliance as well as its importance.

They have referred to four main reasons for the alliance: The Parliament has been rendered non-functional with the adoption of the Presidential system; The perception of 'a trustee will be appointed anyway' has been created; There is an insistence on politics based on the loss of Kurds; The formation of a Kurdistani local election alliance has become indispensable in order to overcome the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government with peoples' will in a democratic legitimate election process. (HK/SD)