Turkey’s agriculture minister, İbrahim Yumaklı, has threatened to sanction opposition mayors and municipal officials who refuse to implement a recently enacted law that is alleged to pave the way for the mass killing of stray dogs in the country.
Yumaklı spoke to TGRT Haber on Thursday about the 17-article law approved by the Turkish parliament on July 30 with the support of 275 lawmakers, all from the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and its far-right ally, the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP). A total of 224 MPs voted against the legislation.
The controversial law, which led to protests for enabling the mass killing of stray dogs, requires municipalities to round up stray dogs and put them in shelters and permits aggressive or ill animals to be euthanized. The law mandates shelter improvements by 2028 and threatens mayors with prosecution if they fail to enforce the law.
The minister said sanctions would be imposed on municipalities that refuse to implement the law and do not spend the municipal funds specified in the law to establish animal shelters, capture and rehabilitate or care for stray dogs until they are adopted.
Recalling that the law requires mayors and municipal officials who fail to comply to be subject to prosecution, Yumaklı said municipalities will be inspected by the ministry on the implementation of the law, in particular the allocation of the necessary funds from the municipal budget and adherence to standards for animal shelters.
While the AKP, which introduced the legislation, claims that the law does not aim for the mass killing of dogs but rather their adoption, the opposition argues that the dogs will be doomed to die due to the poor conditions in overcrowded shelters.
The main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which controls İstanbul and other major cities, had said its mayors would not implement the law if it were passed.
According to the opposition, the AKP pressed ahead with the law to use it as a pretext to punish opposition municipalities since the opposition controls most municipalities due to the defeat the AKP suffered in the March 31 local elections.
Many people think the adoption of more than 4 million stray dogs is impossible in a country where millions of people have difficulty in even meeting their basic needs due to the skyrocketing cost of living.
Animal rights campaigners, who fear the law is a cover for a huge massacre despite government denials, instead advocate a mass sterilization campaign.
CHP takes law to top court
The CHP on Thursday, as it promised, took the law on stray dogs, which it calls “a law of massacre,” to the Constitutional Court, first requesting a stay and then the law’s subsequent cancellation.
CHP deputy group chairman Gökhan Günaydın held a news conference at party headquarters after submitting the 182-page petition to the top court.
He said legal experts and lawmakers from the CHP worked on the petition, exchanging views with professional organizations, bar associations and animal rights organizations to come up with a legally well-written text, submitting the petition on the 13th day after the law’s publication in the Official Gazette.
Günaydın noted that a law can be challenged at the Constitutional Court within the 60-day period following its publication in the Official Gazette.
CHP leader Özgür Özel had said after the passage of the law that his party would challenge it at the Constitutional Court because it “contravenes the right to life guaranteed in the constitution.”