Not work accidents, in fact, licenses to kill
The question is this: The relevant law has been enacted but occupational accidents keep on repeating; we now witness worker deaths on a regular basis. Then what is the problem, where is the problem? The answer is obvious; there are laws but no law.
The rule of law has been thrown to the trash can. We are talking about the justice of a country where corruption and bribery investigations about Cabinet ministers have been halted and shelved.
These accidents that look very much like mass murders are increasing chronically and also intensifying in an economy where the politician distributes “unearned incomes.” This now look like an economy that has turned into a capitalism of nepotism.
Despite the introduction of laws regarding workplace security, more deaths are occurring in an ever increasing dose of workplace accidents. This is the confirmation of the lawless environment that we have been living in for some time now.
There are laws, but everything is proceeding in a lawless manner. This is the result of a majoritarian political atmosphere where the separation of powers and rule of law have been torn down: Those who are close to the political power, which has oppressed constitutional capabilities, do not respect institutions and rules. Also the entrepreneurs who are after multiplying their excess earnings in an economy that operates on such a platform do not necessarily prioritize occupational safety, working conditions, the physical integrity of the worker and their right to live.
Didn’t the mine managers at Soma, where the major accident took place six months ago, in their statements, try to convince us that everything was normal and that they did not understand how this has happened? Again, a similar picture is emerging.
The passion for shopping malls and residences, the passion for excess profit, the passion for converting the excess profits into quick cash, whatever you may call it, if all of these are growing in multi-folds in an economy where the rule of law has been destroyed, then sacrificing lives becomes the norm. Those ruling the country develop perspectives normalizing these in order to veil their responsibilities.
In this lawless business environment
The government’s stance on business murders are also aimed at concealing their responsibility. In those occupational accidents, which have increasingly turned into murders, a new practice has started that is to define the dead as “martyrs.” It is equivalent to curtaining the responsibilities of those managers, Cabinet ministers, politicians whose duties are to regulate and supervise, who hold the executive power in their hands and are in a position to investigate the murder and bring the guilty to account. However, they instead opt for the purple prose of the “martyrs.” What will be the first thing to say now, that “they have gone to heaven, sit back and relax?”
It should be the leading politicians who would be the last ones to say this. It is nothing more than using the beliefs of the society to indoctrinate “bow to the inevitable.”
After each workplace accident, the statements that start with “if there is a responsible…” is actually the expression of a stance; it also shows how much importance is given to human life. Can there be an accident or a murder without a responsible?
In the economic picture of the past 10 years, the “excess profit economy” that stands out with the boost in shopping malls and residences has now started taking lives in masses. The gigantic malls and residences erected in the metropolises will now be remembered with the number of workers who have died during their construction, who have lost their physical integrity and who have become inoperative.
In this lawless business environment where institutions and rules have been made dysfunctional, isn’t each workplace murder a “license to kill” for the next person murdered, unless they are punished with heavy jail sentences and also with the heaviest fines possible that those who have the instinct of excess profit would best understand?
