TV series puts spotlight on hidden sufferings of Sept. 12 coup

“The aim of the series is to display all aspects of the Sept. 12 coup in an objective and fair manner. I believe this is an impressive project. In order to understand the problems we are facing today, we should know what this country experienced in its recent past. This series is a good opportunity for youth, who did not witness the coup period, to learn about our past,” stated political analyst Mümtaz’er Türköne, who contributes to the scenarios of the TV series.

The Sept. 12, 1980 military coup took place with the approval of all military commanders and was the most well-planned and organized one in Turkey’s history. After Sept. 12, the 1961 Constitution was eliminated, and the coup ushered in a new period for Turkish politics.

The coup was a source of great suffering for the citizens as a total of 650,000 people were detained during this period. Files for 1,683,000 people were recorded at police stations. A total of 230,000 people were tried in 210,000 cases, mostly for political reasons. Five-hundred seventeen people were sentenced to death, while 7,000 people faced charges that carried a sentence of capital punishment. Fifty of those who received the death penalty were executed. As a result of the unsanitary conditions and torture in prisons, 299 people died while incarcerated. A total of 144 people died in crimes where the perpetrators could not be found, while 14 died during hunger strikes, 16 were shot to death because they were supposedly trying to escape from prison and 43 people committed suicide.

While 98,404 people were tried for being members of criminal organizations, 388,000 people were refused passports. Some 30,000 people were fired from their jobs. Approximately 14,000 people were stripped of their citizenship, and around 30,000 fled the country as refugees. It was determined that 171 people died because of torture, and 937 movies were banned after being found objectionable. More than 3,800 teachers, 120 university instructors and 47 judges were fired from their jobs. There was a total of 4,000 years of jail time demanded for 400 journalists, of whom 31 completed their sentences. Some 300 journalists were physically assaulted, and three journalists were killed. Newspapers didn’t publish editions for 300 days. Thirty-seven tons of seized newspapers and magazines were destroyed.

“Bu Kalp Seni Unutur Mu?” goes beyond telling about the process that swept Turkey and led to a coup and reveals the inhumane conditions under which individuals were forced to live for many years. It displays the ill-treatment and torture of suspects in detention centers and jails.

According to Türköne, however, the torture scenes in the series are “softened” when compared to the reality.

“In its latest episode, the series mentioned the suffering at Diyarbakır Prison. It does so respectfully but in a more softened manner. We preferred to soften the scenes of torture and violence in order not to intimidate the audience. What the series shows [in terms of violence] is very soft when compared with the reality,” Türköne remarked.

Diyarbakır Prison gained infamy after the Sept. 12 coup as 34 people died there and hundreds were handicapped as a result of ill-treatment and torture. Twenty of those people were tortured to death, five died during hunger strikes, five immolated themselves and four of them hanged themselves in protest of the circumstances.

The ill-treatment in the prison is believed to have played a major role in the establishment and rapid growth of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), a terrorist group Turkey has been fighting against for several years. The group demands autonomy for Turkey’s Kurds in the southeastern part of the country. More than 40,000 people have so far been killed in clashes between Turkish security forces and PKK terrorists.

Several other TV series and films were produced in the past to display the irreparable damage military coups inflicted on people’s lives. Among these were “Hatırla Sevgili” (Remember, Darling), “Çemberimde Gül Oya, Eve Dönüş” (Homecoming), “Babam ve Oğlum” (My Father and My Son) “Zincirbozan” and “Beynelmilel” (The International).

All of those productions took a very different approach in narrating the stories of regular people whose lives were forever changed by the coup and the three-year period of military rule that followed. Though they varied in their scope, genre and subject matter, they all challenged their viewers to critically consider the coup and reflect on its aftermath.

Türköne stressed that such TV productions are very important for showing where a military coup may take a country. “Our people should see what damage military tutelage does to a country,” he noted, adding that the timing of the series was a mere coincidence with the recent developments over a notorious military plot aimed at undermining the country’s ruling party.

Mehmet Metiner, a Kurdish intellectual and columnist, said the series serves as a guideline to understand what forced Kurds to go into the mountains and join the PKK.

“The series illustrates perfectly the appalling cruelty in the prisons. It tells us how non-Turkish speaking Kurds were forced to memorize the Turkish National Anthem and the Pledge of Allegiance. It shows us how Kurdish parents were denied the right to see their jailed sons just because they could not speak Turkish. After the coup, Kurdish identity was denied, and it was prohibited to speak Kurdish even on the streets. The series shows perfectly how all such factors accelerated the process of going to the mountains,” he remarked.

Metiner also stated that the series reveals the difference between the “old” and the “new” Turkey. “It shows us how our democracy has evolved in less than 30 years. I watch this series with both sadness and pleasure,” the columnist added.

Series receives high praise from viewers

“Bu Kalp Seni Unutur Mu?” has garnered a large number of viewers and managed to make it onto a list of most-watched TV series though it has been on television for only four weeks.

Many commentators on “Ekşi Sözlük” (also referred to as Sour Dictionary or Sourtimes), a collaborative hypertext online dictionary, defined the series as a “courageous production revealing the dark sides of Turkey’s recent past.”