BY ERGUN BABAHAN
SABAH- Some young Turkish women have a headscarf problem, as those wearing headscarves aren't allowed to receive a university education in Turkey. There is so much tension over this that if a young girl wearing a headscarf enters a university, the regime could be lost. The headscarf ban is ultimately based on a Constitutional Court ruling. As the court sees the headscarf as a symbol of political Islam, it believes they should be banned at universities. So the only way to end this ban is a constitutional amendment. Speaking to reporters in Spain yesterday, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that they would solve the issue this way and while doing so, they would try not to create tension. He added that even if headscarves are symbols, banning them is wrong.
Actually, these words might sow tension. But it isn't only up to the government. As I've written before, a friend of mine, a political science lecturer, said that people who want to create a crisis before a new constitutional amendment have 26 issues ready and that just one of those could shake the nation. As for a constitutional amendment, I think it's wrong to consider the issue one of only the headscarf ban. Yes, young girls wearing headscarves have a serious problem exercising their educational rights, but though Turkey has passed a great many legal reforms, it hasn't reached the stage of evaluating rights and freedoms from the perspective of individuals. Instead of the possibilities of rights and freedoms for individuals, the harm the state could suffer are being discussed.
We should look at this issue through libertarian lenses, including the educational rights of girls wearing headscarves and the individual as the basis of the state. A young girl wearing a headscarf, an Alevi student, and a Kurdish worker should take their places in this system of freedoms as the holders of general individual rights. It would be unthinkable for a country in the midst of full membership talks with the European Union to be based on an understanding that gives priority to the state. Instead, our foundation should lie in human honor, the principle of equality, and individual freedoms. When these points are given legal guarantees, a lot of our problems will be solved.