Turkey’s ‘Communist mayor’ embarks on conquest of İstanbul district

Fatih Maçoğlu, the popular “Communist mayor” of a city in eastern Turkey, is now vying for control of a vibrant and hip İstanbul district along the Asian banks of the Bosporus.

In 2019 he was elected mayor of Tunceli, a majority Kurdish Alevi city in eastern Anatolia known for being extremely secular and left-leaning.

During his five-year term in office, he won plaudits for knocking down the doors of his office as a form of transparency.

This time, in the March 31 elections, he is setting his sights on the Kadıköy district of İstanbul, a bastion of the secular opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP).

The charismatic, mustached, 55-year-old is standing as a candidate for the Communist Party of Turkey (TKP), which has no seats in the national parliament.

In an interview with AFP during his election campaign in Kadıköy, Maçoğlu said his experience as mayor proved good governance was possible.

“The world is getting worse, and I believe the Socialists can reverse this trend,” he said.

“Socialists are competent to rule this country and this world.”

‘Honest approach’

In 2019 Maçoğlu became the first Communist mayor of Tunceli, a city that was formerly known as Dersim and has a turbulent history.

He took over a city council that had been run by the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) — until it was handed to a government-appointed trustee in the wake of a failed coup in 2016 that aimed to topple long-standing President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

Maçoğlu refused to use his official car and posted his council’s finances on a banner hanging on the front of his office building to show people how he spent their money.

He opened a cooperative to promote organic honey and chickpeas, whose sales funded university students from poor families, and provided free transport for students.

“I followed Maçoğlu’s successful practices closely. I was impressed by his honest approach to politics,” said Sevgi Çelik, a 42-year-old resident of Kadıköy.

“I have faith he will do the same here in Kadıköy,” Çelik added.

“I think we are not going through good times. The country in general is not in a good state. For things to get better, we need better people in power.”

Murat Karabıyık, 46, agreed that the current order needed to change.

“We can’t find shelter. We can’t eat. We can’t drink. We can’t travel. This must change,” he said.

“People affiliated with political parties are usually chasing profits. This is not the case here. God willing, we will change this.”

Asked if he would stick to the same novel approach if elected mayor of Kadıköy, Maçoğlu said: “Of course. Our city functions because we have a program.”

Maçoğlu’s bid for Kadıköy — an arty neighborhood with lively cafes, bars and galleries — drew rebuke from supporters of the CHP and the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party), which is also running in the election in İstanbul.

They said Maçoğlu should have run for a working-class district of İstanbul or else stayed in Tunceli.

Maçoğlu told AFP he found the criticism useful but said he was not opposed to either of the opposition parties.

“We are Socialists. We want to explain to the public that there are better programs. We are not against any party.”

‘We will win’

Some commentators say Maçoğlu could draw votes from people disappointed with the CHP, which took control of İstanbul in 2019 from Erdoğan’s Islamic conservative Justice and Development Party (AKP).

“You can be assured that we will win,” he said confidently.

Maçoğlu has promised transparency, freedoms and accountability, including opening the council’s resources to the general public, rather than reserving the funds for individuals or monopolies.

He said he would be inclusive towards all groups — including the LGBTQ community, which freely expresses itself in Kadıköy and is frequently attacked by Erdoğan’s right-wing alliance.

Erdoğan has consistently railed against LGBTQ people in Turkey.

They were a particular target of his on the campaign trail for last year’s presidential election, when he accused them of threatening traditional family values and called them “perverse.”

“We defend everyone’s right to life, including LGBTQ people,” Maçoğlu said.

“We say this especially because the current political climate marginalizes these issues.”

Asked if the “Communist mayor” nickname bothered him, Maçoğlu said: “Not at all. It makes me happy.”

“Communism is a way of life. The capitalist, imperialist system has given Communists a very bad image that they don’t deserve,” he said.

“Wherever I go in the country, there are millions of people who say, ‘If this is Communism, it’s very good.'”

© Agence France-Presse