Gov’t working to meet demands of Alevi-Bektashi citizens: Erdoğan

NEVŞEHİR

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has said the government is extending efforts to meet Alevi-Bektashi citizens’ demands determined during visits by officials to 1,585 cemevis and that 5,600 of 8,740 requests made have already been fulfilled.

“As far as the remaining requests are concerned, the interior, culture and justice ministries are carrying out works, which will inshallah be completed soon,” Erdoğan said on Aug. 13 during the commemoration events organized for the 751st death anniversary of Alevi mystic Hacı Bektaş Veli in Nevşehir.

The government will soon hold a collective ceremony for the eight cemevis whose construction is complete or nearing completion in various cities, Erdoğan added.

All of the 85 million citizens of this country are first-class citizens of the Republic of Türkiye, each one of them with the same rights and privileges, and they will never give up on anyone of them, Erdoğan said.

“Those who still cannot accept our existence in Anatolia, dating back a thousand years, have for sure intentions to dismember our homeland by sowing seeds of division among our people,” the president said.

“To this end, they have been exerting every effort from fueling sectarian and dispositional differences to instigating racial or ideological polarization. We know quite well the real objectives and mentors of those who cannot tolerate even the slightest step we take to strengthen our unity, solidarity and fraternity,” he added.

The president said he believes that with this belief and determination, they have overcome all the vital tests the country has been subjected to, from the Mongol invasion to the Dardanelles War and from the national struggle to the fight against terrorism that has left its mark on Türkiye’s last 40 years.

Erdoğan said there were “dirty plots” that sought to be staged particularly by some European countries over the Alevi-Bektashi citizens.

“Our citizens will not tolerate any step taken as an attempt to disconnect the Alevi Bektashi community from Islam and will be retaliated with a mighty blow,” he stated.

Highlighting that plots and provocations taking place in this regard are witnessed on a daily basis, Erdoğan noted: “We will together foil these insidious and despicable schemes by holding more tightly onto our unity, solidarity, fraternity and commonalities.”

Erdoğan met with representatives of Alevi and Bektashi associations at Hüseyin Gazi Cemevi and attended the Muharram iftar with the representatives of the Alevi community late on Aug. 8. In the month of Muharram, the Alevi community commemorates the killing of Imam Hussein, the grandson of Prophet Muhammad.