On Nov 12, Sezgin Tanrikulu, deputy chairman of Turkey’s main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), unwittingly initiated a controversy in his party. On a popular political talk show on CNNTurk, Tanrikulu spoke about the “Dersim massacre” of 1937-38 and “apologized” for this incident “on behalf of my party.” The next day, various deputies from the CHP slammed Tanrikulu, arguing that there is nothing to apologize for or that there is nothing about Dersim that should bother the CHP. This debate is not just about the past, but also the future of Turkey’s main opposition party, so it deserves a closer look.
Dersim was a province in the Ottoman Empire and then in republican Turkey until 1935, when it was renamed Tunceli. That was also the year when the Turkish republic, under the “single-party regime” of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk and his CHP, initiated a “resettlement plan” to subdue the rebellious tribes in this mountainous region. The next three years brought growing tension and ultimately armed conflict between government forces and armed rebels.
