PROTEST AGAINST BULU
Boğaziçi University students: Appointing a rector is legal, but also political
* Video and photo: Pols302
Click to read the article in Turkish
After Justice and Development Party (AKP) Chair and President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan appointed Prof. Melih Bulu, an academic outside its community, as the new president of Boğaziçi University, the students and faculty members have been protesting the appointment.
Today (January 25) marks the 25th day of the protests.
'Legal... Political...'
In several statements so far, Melih Bulu has argued that his appointment to the university "complies with the law", so, is legal.
In response to this, a group of students from the university's Department of Political Science and International Relations have prepared a video, making a word play with the Turkish words "yasal" (legal) and "siyasal" (political). Listing a series of controversial "legal" decisions taken in the country over the years, the students have said:
"Yes, appointing a university president is legal; but so is dismissing the Governor of the Central Bank at 3 at night.
"Yes, appointing a university president is legal; but so is reducing the prison sentence of perpetrators of feminicides because they wear a suit.
"Yes, appointing a university president is legal; but so is zoning the forests for the construction of mining companies.
"Yes, appointing a university president is legal; but so is preventing the campaigns of municipalities during the pandemic
"Yes, appointing a university president is legal; but so is giving guaranteed numbers for passages on unused highways and bridges.
"Yes, appointing a university president is legal; but so is filling the state institutions with relatives.
"Yes, appointing a university president is legal; but so is cancelling the İstanbul Local Elections on March 31.
"Yes, appointing a university president is legal; but so is buying official cars by spending millions.
"Yes, appointing a university president is legal; but so is constructing the Ankapark for 750 million dollars.
"Yes, appointing a university president is legal; but so is giving all state tenders to the same five companies."
"Evet, rektör ataması yasal ama..." #BoğaziciSecimİstiyor #KabulEtmiyoruzVazgecmiyoruz pic.twitter.com/e8tqVWhSVA
— pols302 (@pols302) January 23, 2021
On the other side, as they have been doing since January 5, a group of faculty members have once again turned their backs to the Rector's Office in protest against the appointed university president Bulu.
Academics have protested Prof. Melih Bulu for an hour at the South Campus despite the pouring rain.
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. 40 people in total were detained over the protests. All of the detained were released on January 7 and 8, 2021. About Melih BuluProf. 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/SD)