soL English

Hasip Kaplan’s suggestion for ethnical origin to be asked during census raised the question what is aimed by the result of the census.

Along with the initiatives, the discussion of the histıry of Turkey through religion ethnicity has come to the point of suggestion for determining the numbers. DTP parliament member Hasip Kaplan suggested the questioning of ethnical origin at the census of 2011 thus determinimg how many Turks, Kurds, Lazs, Armenians, Circassians and people from other ethnical origins are there in Turkey and the results of this kind of censuses done before became a current issue. The first questions that come up are how are results that will come out in case the numbers are updated going to be evaluated and would a classification based on ethnicity and religious origins will deepen the discrimination among the society. In the censuses of 1927 and 1965, ethnical origin had been asked. In 1965, 90.11% of the population stated the native language as Turkish. 7.07% speaks Kurdish, 0.48% speaks Zaza language, 0.09% speaks Georgian, 0.07% speaks Pomak, 0.06% speaks Bosnian, and 0.04% speaks Albanian as their native language. 0.66% stated their language as the “others”

EU and CIA researched it too
The question about ethnicity has not been asked after 1965 but EU has the results of a more current research done in 2005. The statistics foundation of European Commission Eurobarometer did research titled “Europeans and Their Languages” between May – June 2005. If we proportion the results of this research, 64 million 365 thousand 390 people out of 71 million 517 thousand 100 speak Turkish as their native language and 6 million 436 thousand 539 people’s native language is another one.

According to the data of 2008 of World Factbook of CIA on the internet, 70 – 75 percent of the Turkish population speaks Turkish, 18 percent speaks Kurdish. The rest is said to be the minority and the ratio is 7 – 12 percent.

There had been debates in the parliament earlier
At the beginning of November, in his speech in the parliament on the meeting of Planning and Budget Commission, Hasip Kaplan said that 20 million Kurds live in Turkey and his words caused a quarrel between members of DTP and AKP; and AKP and MHP. Obviously, when the census takes place and the results are declared, new discussions may come up. Looking at this example, we can say now that the results of these discussions will deepen the discrimination amongst people who come from different ethnical origins, especially Turks and Kurds.

(soL - News Desk)