Within the scope of the political normalization process, public expectations for an increase in the minimum wage and pensions were on the agenda during CHP Chairman Özgür Özer’s one-on-one meeting with President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and CHP Deputy Chairman Yalçin Karatepe and Finance Minister Mehmet Şimşek.
At the call of CHP leader Ezer, a “We Can’t Live” rally was held in Gebze yesterday, and after the rally, Finance Minister Simsek said today that “Turkey’s minimum wage is not low.” He said, “During the AK Party government, we raised the minimum wage above the growth rate.”
CHP Chairman Ezer responded harshly to Minister Şimşek’s comments on the minimum wage. During a program he attended in Aydın, Ezer responded to Şimşek’s points on the minimum wage by saying, “If you don’t have a means of livelihood, you have options.”
“Know your place and give us our rights.”
Responding to Minister Şimşek’s words to “know your position,” Özer also promised that the purchasing power of citizens would increase tenfold under the CHP government, saying:
“Yesterday we held a big workers’ rally in Gebze. There were workers, retirees, merchants and farmers in the square. We all shouted together. We said that we cannot get along. If you cannot get along, then listen to our voice. Raise the minimum wage with inflation. Remove the minimum pension from 10,000 lira and make it the same as the minimum wage. Pay subsidies to farmers, increase them and re-determine the base price. Cancel interest on debts. Pay in installments. For this, we said that we can find the sources we are looking for in taxes and the judiciary.
Mehmet Şimşek, who will listen to our voices and raise the minimum wage and increase pensions, said today: “The minimum wage in Turkey is not low,” he said. “It is higher than in Indonesia, Thailand, Chile and Colombia,” he said. In fact, when I read this, I said to him, “Hans is coming.” He is on vacation in Didim with his pension. Our uncle Hasan cannot pass in front of the market. “He cannot enter the butcher’s shop,” I said. He said, “Ours is higher than Indonesia and Chile.”
Turkey only has values that the minimum wage is high. The only thing that makes Turkey’s minimum wage high is their conscience. The conscience of this government is below the minimum wage. The richest 20 percent of Turkey will receive 81 percent of the income, and the poorest 20 percent will receive 0.5 percent. That means that on the one hand, you will have the comfort of Spain, Denmark, Norway, Sweden. Hey, Mehmet Simsek! No employee or retiree will look at the example of Thailand and say, “I’m satisfied because I’m doing better than Indonesia.” Know your position and do what’s right. Let’s break it down.
“Within 10 years, we will set zero for prices, not salaries.”
Yesterday, a voice came from Gebze saying, “We cannot make a living.” So we said, “Government, please listen to this voice. If you have no livelihood, you have no choice, and if you have no livelihood, you have no choice. We will make our voice heard by those who cannot hear us. But if they continue to persist, we will fight a great fight together. Sooner or later, we will definitely defeat this government in the first elections. We do not have 360 MPs for early elections, and neither do the opposition parties. Early elections will not be held when we want them, but when you want them, when the people want them. If the people cry for early elections, the ballot box will definitely come and the government will change. I promise you. Just as we won the first local elections in two centuries, and just as we made our party the first party in 47 years, we will work with mayors, organizations, parliamentarians, party officials, with smiles on our faces, to make the peasants masters of the country again and to end the suffering of merchants by increasing the number of minimum wage workers and retirees….
We will definitely build a prosperous economy, a very fair tax system, a social state that enriches its people, and a social state where wealth is distributed more fairly, not by the rich, but by the wealthy, who protect and defend their assets. We are working hard to strengthen the rights of the owners of these wealth, so that the main producers can have their rights. We will put the CHP in power in the first elections. I promise you. What we will do is to save the country once again and establish democracy. Once again, it is about saving the people from victimization, slavery, hunger, want and poverty. Seeing these people as equals, as citizens, will serve them best. We promise you that under our rule, this country will move in the direction that Ataturk showed. Of course, it will be with the European Union. There will be no visa problems. We are not going to remove six zeros from the currency, or zero both salaries and prices, like they did. Within 10 years, we will remove one zero from prices, not from salaries. We will increase your purchasing power tenfold. We promise you. “
