Mehmet Emin Yalcinkaya, an actor, director, playwright and translator who has been involved with the Diyarbakir Metropolitan Municipality City Theatre (DBST) since its founding in 1990, was on tour with the theatre in Iran when various municipalities were placed under a state of emergency decrees.
Suleyman Soylu, the interior minister, announced on 9 September 2016 that the administrations of 28 municipalities would “no longer be in the hands of terrorists.” Most of these municipalities were run by DBP, the sister party of HDP (Peoples’ Democratic Party), Turkey’s main Kurdish opposition.
The municipality of Diyarbakir’s Sur district, where Yalcinkaya worked, was also on the list.
As of 5 January 2017, 51 municipalities run by the DBP (out of 106) have been taken over with state of emergency decrees due to alleged ties to the PKK, deemed a terrorist organization by Turkey. Seventy-two mayors from the DBP are under arrest.
Upon their return to Diyarbakir, Yalcinkaya and two other actors from the city theatre, Vural Tantekin and Sahabettin Dag, were told the trustee assigned them to work in the municipal police department. The set carpenter Recep Ertli and prompter Hasan Bukey were moved to the public works department and assigned to various labour-intensive tasks such as carrying sand for a playground. They were, in fact, already formally listed as staff of these departments, but this had previously been an arrangement on paper only – until the trustee took control of the municipality.
Yalcinkaya said that he had to go to the police station for a couple of days but didn’t wear the uniform. He points out that this would have felt quite awkward. Having acted in the city theatre for more than 25 years (as King Claudius in “Hamlet”, Creon in “Antigone”, and Mem’s uncle in “Mem û Zîn”, among other roles) as well as on national television series, his face is well known in the city. “I told them I was there for acting and didn’t want to take on the role they found appropriate for me,” he said in an interview conducted over the phone.
None of this is actually new to Yalcinkaya. In 1994, when the Islamist Welfare Party (RP) won Diyarbakir’s municipal elections, the theatre was shut down, and Yalcinkaya was “exiled to the sanitation department,” as he puts it. He worked as a cleaner in the municipality and as an actor at night. After a while, he left to work for private theatres, returning in 1999 when Kurdish HADEP won the Diyarbakir municipal elections. “There was and is no tolerance for Kurdish theatre,” Yalcinkaya said.
Despite the theatre workers’ attempts, the trustee refused to meet with them, and they all submitted requests to leave their positions without losing the benefits they had earned over the years. Yalcinkaya was fired the next day, on 25 October 2016, with a note stating that he would not be given any benefits. He said the municipality owes him more than 150 thousand Turkish Liras (about 42 thousand USD) and that he has filed a lawsuit against these sanctions.
On 4 January 2017, all the remaining 31 actors and actresses were fired. All they received was a note citing new regulations passed by the trustee in December and announcing that their contracts would not be renewed this year.
Yalcinkaya, who tried to find a place for the new theatre building with his friends, was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in the process. Although he was treated in the intensive care unit for a long time, he succumbed to the disease.
Name: Mehmet Emin Yalcinkaya
Names of Children: 4 children
Occupational Achievement and Work History:
25 years of theatre instructor
Worked last at Amed City Theatre
Books and Other Works:
The plays he wrote:
“Mala Dinan”,
“Mala Extiyaran” “Zembilfroş”
Books he wrote:
1- “Mr Yasar, neither he lives, nor he doesn’t (or Mr Yasar, neither he enjoys his life, nor he doesn`t (Yaşar Ne Yaşar Ne Yaşamaz)”,
2-“My Beautiful Shoe (Benim Güzel Pabuçlarım)”,
3- “Miho from Aladag (Aladaglı Miho)”
The decision and the Date of suspension:
Decision and Date of Law Decree(KHK)
Decree No. 674 on September 1, 2016
