The press release of the faculty and staff of Istanbul University and Cerrahpasa Istanbul University was blocked by police at the Beyazit campus, very place where the members of Association of Anatolian Youth and National Youth Foundation had held their function on Police watch last week.
The faculty and staff of Istanbul University and Cerrahpasa Istanbul University wanted to announce a press release in Beyazit Square in support of the functions in Bogazici University. Upon Police warned them to disperse, the academicians made their press announcement walking. The press release said “We agree with the rightful opposition against the rector appointment inconsistent with required qualifications and legitimacy; against the founding of two departments by decree, imposed from the top down and without the involving the univesity senate; and we are in support of anybody using their constitutional rights defending academic freedom and university autonomy.”
The statement the academicians read out contained the following:
"As the faculty and staff Istanbul University and Cerrahpasa Istanbul University, we agree with the rightful opposition against the rector appointment inconsistent with required qualifications and legitimacy; against the founding of two departments by decree, imposed from the top down and without involving the university senate; and we are in support of anybody using their constitutional rights defending academic freedom and university autonomy. We demand that it be refrained from such provocative attempts as to frame certain faculty members and student communities by claiming that they organized the peaceful protests carried out by Bogazici University students, faculty and components in very high participation and prudently in order to protect their institution. It is a new example of anti-democratic enforcements of those many universities in Turkey had been made subjected to in recent years, and of those that have happened in Bogazici University for over a month. As the faculty and staff of Istanbul University and Cerrahpasa Istanbul University, we are unfortunately not alien to these interferences targeting the foundational principles of the university. In the year 2015, the self-control of our university in the rector election was discarded and instead of the candidate who had received the most votes, the candidate with less votes had been appointed. After this, in 2018, ignoring the historical roots, the entirety and the institutional identity of our university, it was split into two. The downfall of the universities of Turkey in the international ranking of universities coincides with this period in which the anti-democratic enforcements on universities intensified.
“We repeat it today too just as we in those days voiced our opposition to all the decisions from top down, outside the autonomous and democratic university processes. The main component of the universities is the students body. As the faculty members, we spend our efforts for students to become the individuals laying the claim for the ownership of democratic principles and universal values, to become free individuals benefitting the community in which they live. For using their right to peaceful protest for the academic and administrative autonomy of universities, the subjugation of our students to unproportional police violence both shadows those efforts of ours and blights the students’ hopes for our country. Our demand is that the students using their constitutional rights in this process, taken into custody, arrested, and placed into house arrest be released without any charge.
“It should not be forgotten that this outstanding period, that we have been living in because of a pandemic in global scale, has proved one more time and perhaps in most powerful manner that the communities need scientific research and development. Scientific research can only be carried out in the institutions freed from all sorts of oppression, with academic freedom and autonomy; and the science can only serve for the communities dedicated to these principles. the faculty and staff of Istanbul University and Cerrahpasa Istanbul University, we respectfully announce to the public that we will defend at all costs the values that make us a university, and that using the right to oppose in democratic ways is a human right and dignity.” (EVRENSEL DAILY)
Hediye Levent
Yusuf Karadaş
Yücel Özdemir