Memihan Zeydan 

 

WAN - Artemêt Municipality, which reopened women's centres closed down during the trustee period and established units to combat violence, aims to strengthen women's participation in social, economic and professional life.

 

A total of 14 municipalities, including Wan Metropolitan Municipality and district municipalities, which had been governed by trustees for more than eight years, started to be governed by the Peoples' Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) after the 31 March elections. 

 

DEM Party municipalities are rebuilding women's institutions that were first targeted and closed down by the trustees. Artemêt (Edremit) Municipality is also trying to repair the damages caused by the trusteeship with a populist and women-oriented municipality practice.  

 

Rabia Basak Koc, Co-Mayor of Artemêt Municipality, and Gunes Ogmen, Municipal Council member, made evaluations on the women's work they are carrying out.

 

‘We have “Stop violence against women” units’

 

Gunes Ogmen, a member of the Artemêt Municipality Assembly, said that the first action of the trustees was to close down women's organisations. 

 

Gunes said, "When we went to the municipality, there was nothing in the field of women. After 8 years, we started to open our women's directorates. We are re-opening and re-activating all our institutions that we had built before and were closed by the trustees. 

 

Recently, we opened the Şamîran Women's Life Centre. In addition to education and hobby areas, we have ‘Stop violence against women’ units in our centre. We have also started to receive violence applications from our violence hotline."

 

Workshops for women 

 

Expressing that the main purpose of the life centres is to provide a social space for women and to get women out of the four walls, Gunes said,"Women spend almost all of the day at home taking care of children. By opening life centres in neighbourhoods, we will continue to open our centres so that women who only spend time at home can both learn a job and produce something with their own labour. 

 

There are many courses in the life centres we have opened. There are many workshops such as rug workshop, instrument workshops, handicrafts, sports. In addition to these, while women spend time here, children will spend time safely in the nursery in the life centre. We will continue with these activities. We will work to establish women's life centres everywhere."

 

‘We asked the demands of women one-to-one’

 

Sharing that they also support families economically, Gunes added that they also endeavour to help women meet their basic needs and acquire a profession. 

 

Gunes added, "At the end of the completed courses, vocational certificates are given. We started to open violence units in neighbourhoods. Some women exposed to violence do not have access to a telephone. Therefore, we started to open violence units in each neighbourhood so that they can get help faster. 

 

With these units, we aim to reach more women, to make them feel that they are not alone and to stand by them. For more than six months, we have had our original meetings in almost all neighbourhoods and we have reached many women and asked their demands one-on-one."

 

Projects related to Kuwait Houses

 

Mentioning that they are also working for the Kuwait Houses in Artemêt, Gunes said that they started their work after learning the demands and needs of women during their visit to the houses. 

 

Gunes said, "Women have been staying there for years and nothing has been done for them until today. After we took over the municipalities, we started to fulfil our promises to them. Our first job was to organise a festival for the children there. Because it is very far from the city centre, it is located on the outskirts of the city and there is no place for children to socialise.

 

At the same time, the Metropolitan Municipality visited these houses in the presence of the Women's Directorate, psychologists and sociologists, and we received scholarship applications from 37 households. In addition to these, we also provided Jinkart and life cards where they can shop for groceries."

 

Rabia Basak Koc, Co-Mayor of Artemêt Municipality, emphasised that women's work will continue continuously, and stated that they will frequently meet with women door-to-door in the district and will continue their work in line with the demands of women. Rabia underlined that they aim to make not only Artemêt but also Wan more livable and safe for women.