Instruction from Kiliçdaroğlu to the Chp ranks: This is what you will do in the coming two months

CHP General Chair Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu addressed a meeting of his party’s provincial chairs at the Hilton Garden Hotel in Ankara.

The key points from Kılıçdaroğlu's speech were as follow:

We come from a tradition that does not discriminate. We took firm charge of the ballot boxes. We kept our word to our people. Ballot box security for those who went and voted was down to us but we then saw that the votes were stolen at the Supreme Election Council and not at the ballot box. They changed the rule after the count had ended in the east. The statute says that unstamped voting slips are invalid but they made them valid.

The votes were stolen at the Supreme Election Council and not at the ballot box. You are going to ask, ‘Why did you trust the Supreme Election Council, brother?’ This is why we trusted them. The articles of the statute are so explicit. You don’t even have to be literate. You will place the two articles of the statute I read in your pocket. You will take them out everywhere you go and read them to citizens.

1- Envelopes that do not have the sub-province election council’s stamp on them shall be deemed invalid. There is no need to put on a judge’s robes for this.

2- Article 101: Voting slips that do not have the polling committee stamp on their rear shall be invalid. But they made these ones valid, too. We saw that there are judges who have no consciences and morality.

This referendum showed us two things. If we work, we can win. Secondly, we discriminated against nobody while working. For the first time, we found the opportunity to work together with everybody. Thirdly, we did not use anybody’s beliefs and life styles for political ends and respected them. This shows that, if we continue to do this, we will be Turkey’s uniting force. We did not engage in blind opposition. One of the things that we gained in this process is that we did not engage in blind opposition. So, for the first time, citizens not aligned with the CHP approved of us. Informed opposition raises our bar in democratic terms.

Security of life and property. Defending the life and property of those who do not think like us. We found the opportunity to extol the virtue of democracy to wide masses.

Other political parties and civil society organisations were influenced by this mode of ours. They said that the Republican People’s Party is doing the correct thing.

INSTRUCTION FROM KILIÇDAROĞLU TO THE CHP RANKS

What are we to do? In the coming two months, you will revisit everywhere you went in the course of the referendum. A courtesy visit. It is not important how they voted. You will convey gratitude saying, ‘We did all that was in our power. You did your duty as citizens and that is why we have come here.’