Twitter users protest plan to close prep schools in Turkey
#DershaneyleGelenADALET
Date posted: November 18, 2013
Government proposal would close thousands of private ‘dershanes’, seen by many as filling a gap in state education system.
Turkish Twitter users are in an uproar over a report that the government has drafted a law which would close thousands of private preparatory education centres (known as “dershanes”) across the country. Turkish newspaper Zaman claims the draft law would also impose fines on those that do not abide.
Minister of Education Nabi Avci, responding to the report, denied that the final version of the draft law had been completed.
The dershanes provide students with supplementary education in order to prepare them for university entrance exams. The schools are reportedly a point of tension between Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government and the Islamic movement [Hizmet] that runs many of the schools.
Sevgi Akarcesme, columnist at Today’s Zaman, writes:
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Erdogan’s propaganda channels and instruments have been referring to Hizmet as the “Gülenist Terror Organisation” for years and over the past months, this full-fledged criminalisation campaign has often seen relations between the Hizmet network and the Catholic Church – including the Vatican – being dragged into it. This has primarily been witnessed in the most staunchly nationalist press channels.
Mothers, fathers crying and praying due to extensive victimization
Mothers cried out and made objections wherever state brutality was observed. This noble and peaceful attitude was not only displayed at the education institutions affiliated with the Hizmet movement.
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Police raid successful Gülen-inspired schools in western Turkey
Just after another Gülen-inspired school was raided by the police in the southern province of Gaziantep on Monday, private schools established by the volunteers from the Hizmet Movement were raided in the western province of İzmir on Tuesday morning.
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