İBRAHİM DOĞUŞ SPEAKS TO BIANET
Kurdish Mayor for London Borough of Lambeth
Click to read the article in Turkish
İbrahim Doğuş from the Labour Party has been elected Mayor of Lambeth, the most crowded borough in London.
Kurdish circles know him for his studies on the Kurds as the director of the Centre for Turkey Studies (CEFTUS), and he is known in the media of the UK for his voluntary efforts.
On March 22, 2017, five people lost their lives in an attack targeted the UK parliament in Westminster. Doğuş kept his restaurant open until late night and offered free food for the police and emergency workers. In the wake of the incident, he was awarded by the Lambeth Municipality with a certificate of appreciation.
Just after he assumed office at the borough municipality, Doğuş answered bianet's questions.
There is a very large Kurdish population in the UK. As the Kurdish Mayor of Lambeth, do you have projects for the education of the Kurdish language and for cultural and political activities?
Because there are not many citizens who are members of the Kurdish or the Turkish societies, projects like language education or cultural studies are unfortunately not in our priorities at this point.
When we last met in 2016, clashes were going on in Diyarbakır's Sur district. You were among the delegation from the UK, whose members made examinations, then prevented from doing so by police detention. You are a politician who follows the developments closely. On the level of the municipalities, do you have cooperation with the Municipality of Sur?
We have communication with several municipalities in Turkey. In the future, we will make efforts to even improve the relations between the municipalities. Diyarbakır's Municipality of Sur is one of the municipalities that we would like to be in touch with. I try to closely follow the political developments in Turkey, our endeavor regarding this will continue.
A "Kurdish-friendly" party
You have been working within the Labour Party for years and define them as "Kurdish-friendly". What do you mean by that?
The Labour, with its 100-year history, is one of the most rooted political parties of Britain. Our party members, elected politicians, high-level executives consist of people who closely follow the international political and social developments and run international solidarity campaigns because they have a leftist, socialist and internationalist identity. For this reason, we are a party that closely follows the developments in the region, especially in Turkey.
As a party who knows the difficulties the Kurdish society face in Iraq, Iran, Syria and Turkey, we are a friend of the Kurds as we stand with all segments of the society that are subjected to injustice.
The Centre for Kurdish Progress
As the Director of the CEFTUS, you did research on the Kurds. Can we talk about a Kurdish lobby in the UK? If there is such a lobby, how kind of influence does it have on the politics of the UK?
The CEFTUS, the Centre for Turkey Studies is an institution that aims developing friendly relations between Turkey and Britain, making the interior and foreign policies of Turkey perceived correctly, supporting positive developments, criticizing negative developments.
Apart from the CEFTUS, we also have a working group named Centre for Kurdish Progress. This group runs programs on the Kurds' social and political problems together with think tanks and the academic world, to make the problems the Kurds face in the Middle East understood correctly.
Who is İbrahim Doğuş?Doğuş is 38 years old. He was born in the district of Elbistan in the southeastern province of Maraş. He has been living in the UK for about 30 years. Doğuş is a businessperson who owns kebab restaurants. He has been continuing his political career at the Labour Party for about 20 years. About Lambeth BoroughLambeth is one of the historical central boroughs of London, on the shores of the Thames river. The area was famous for its gardens in the 17th century. In the 18th century, it became a production center with glass and ceramic workshops. In World War II, the factories were among the first targets of the Nazis, hence they were destroyed in airstrikes. Lambeth today homes the South Bank Centre, which includes the Royal Festival Hall, Queen Elizabeth Hall, Royal National Theatre, National Film Theatre and the Hayward Gallery. The Waterloo Station, the Imperial War Museum, London Aquarium and the London Eye are also within the borders of the borough. Its population is around 328 thousand, according to the population count in 2016. Afro-Caribbeans, Africans, South Asians and the Chinese make around one-third of its population. |
(MB/HK/VK)
*This conversation has been made in Turkish and translated into English by bianet editors.