Participatory democracy is embodied in the Turkish Parliament’s petitions committee, or "dilekçe komisyonu" in Turkish, that oversees the demands and suggestions of citizens.
The committee plays an active role in resolving the problems of ordinary citizens and addressing their demands. The committee’s chair, Sunay Karamık, said the wide array of demands on issues affecting the daily lives of people and the improvement of public services often guides their path to find solutions to problems that need comprehensive solutions. “They also reinforce our determination to strengthen democratic participation,” Karamık told Anadolu Agency (AA) on Monday.
It is one of three committees where citizens have direct access, and in the latest term of the Parliament, it received an average of 28 petitions daily.
Every petition is recorded and categorized by the committee’s experts and delivered to regular meetings of the Parliament’s presidential council. There, the council members discuss them and decide on the subsequent process for petitions. In the past two years, the committee received some 20,000 applications, and so far, the council has decided on about 9,500 petitions. Petitions requiring implementation of new laws or amendments to existing ones are also referred to the office of the Parliamentary Speaker, while one copy is delivered to the president’s office. The council’s decisions that require the preparation of draft bills are declared to lawmakers. Occasionally, the committee receives petitions outside its jurisdiction and rules for inaction while petition holders are informed.
Karamık, a lawmaker for the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party), chairs meetings of the committee members on petitions, and together, they assess the source of problems citizens seek solutions for and seek information from relevant public institutions to that extent.
The committee plays a decisive role in addressing the problems voiced by citizens, from outlandish to crucial.
One of the concrete examples of the committee’s efficiency is related to a citizen’s complaint about credit card fees. The citizen applied to the committee after his/her bank refused to return the fee despite regulations barring banks from charging customers for ownership of the card. After correspondence with the Banking Regulation and Supervision Agency (BDDK) and the management of the said bank, the committee helped the citizen reimburse the fee.
Another citizen sought the return of his deep freezer, which he loaned to teams working in aid and rescue work after the Feb. 6, 2023, earthquakes in southern Türkiye. The committee’s investigation found the deep freezer at a state institution whose staff moved the deep freezer by mistake to the capital, Ankara, after the aid work was wrapped up. After correspondence with the institution, the committee ensured the delivery of a deep freezer to the applicant’s address.
A citizen complained about the inappropriate manners of a train station ticket office attendant while buying a ticket in the southern province of Adana. The committee informed the railway authority about the matter, and in turn, the authority launched an investigation into the attendant. As a result, the attendant was disciplined and fined.
Other resolved petitions include one about improvement of a village road in western province of Çanakkale, evacuation of chickens emitting odor from a residential area, demand for demolition of illegally built structures, fixing bureaucratic errors that made a citizen ineligible for disability benefits, installation of street lighting to a neighborhood in a small town in northern province of Samsun, cancellation of wrongfully issued traffic fine and construction of a house for an earthquake victim.
Karamık says every voice matters to them, and they work to contribute to efforts to strengthen democracy. “Petitions constitute an important data source; they reflect problems people from different segments of society face, and they reflect public expectations,” she said. She points out that the committee is among the rare institutional mechanisms in direct contact with citizens. “We are not only assessing personal applications, we are also detecting social needs in general and developing solutions. Together, we expand participatory democracy and build a future shaped by citizens’ expectations and demands,” she added.
