Özdemir İnce

Citizenship is not for sale

12 Temmuz 2024 Cuma

This is social justice in taxation! Stop favoring cronies and relatives! Do not engage in the bravado of forgiving billions and millions in taxes owed by your favorites! Stop investing in unproductive places, building useless airports, and resorting to the build-operate-transfer schemes; stop wasting money recklessly. Change your mindset and act according to scientific principles in worldly matters, not sacred decrees!

Now, let’s discuss the reason for this introduction: You do not respect the sanctity of citizenship. The title of citizenship is very sacred. It is acquired through ancestral blood and sweat, through lineage. In rare cases, it can be granted to very distinguished individuals. Citizenship should be guarded jealously, with exceptions limited to one or two, at most three or four, per year.

Yet, you are granting citizenship to hordes numbering in the millions, without the slightest concern for value, without subjecting them to language tests, Turkish knowledge exams, citizenship oaths, or ceremonies.

According to Article 5 of the Turkish Citizenship Law No. 5901 dated May 29, 2009, Turkish citizenship is acquired by birth or subsequently.

Article 9 states that Turkish citizenship acquired subsequently occurs through a decision of the competent authority, adoption, or the exercise of the right of choice.

Applicants must have resided in Turkey for an uninterrupted five years prior to the application date. Other conditions, such as "having good moral character," are also required.

There is even a provision requiring "sufficient Turkish language proficiency," which essentially means "Tarzanca" (broken language). Where are the reading and writing, Turkish knowledge exams?

Now, let’s address the most disgraceful method of obtaining citizenship: According to Article 20, paragraph (b) of the Regulation on the Implementation of the Turkish Citizenship Law, foreign individuals who purchase real estate worth at least 400,000 US dollars or equivalent foreign currency or Turkish lira, with a commitment not to sell it for three years, or who make a promise to purchase real estate with an equivalent value established by a notarized contract, are eligible for Turkish citizenship by the decision of the President.

This is akin to selling your home’s refrigerator, washing machine, television, and sofa when you go bankrupt. Will the foreign individual who bought property for 400,000 dollars and committed not to transfer it for three years sell the same house or apartment to your own citizen for 800,000 dollars after three years? Yes, they will! They gain citizenship for free and make a profit of 400,000 dollars. While you are doing this, look at what is happening in Turkey: In a street interview, a woman was asked if she had a child. She likely said she had a child in elementary school. She was asked, "Can you put enough food in the lunchbox?" The woman said she could, but her child once came home and immediately ran to the kitchen. The child had shared their food with a friend who had none at school. While there is food assistance for students at school, it is given only to Syrians, not to everyone.

Yes, yes! Why are you making Syrians citizens? Why is healthcare and medicine free for Syrians? Why are you allocating university quotas without exams for them? The AKP Chairman Erdoğan, who is believed to have a good sense of the Turkish public’s pulse, sings a different tune: “We will proudly carry the honor of being a host (Ansar) to Syrian immigrants in their most difficult times, like a medal of honor on our chest.” He gives examples from Islamic history: Supposedly, the Turks resemble the Ansar of Medina, who hosted the Muslims who fled from Mecca to Medina. Almost all of the Turkish public is unaware of the outcomes of the story of the Ansar of Medina and the Meccan refugees. The Meccan refugees first drove out the Jews of Medina, then became the masters of the Ansar of Medina! Understood now?


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