End promised to Ankara's 'trauma'

"Ankara has become a city of unhappy and indignant people during the rule of current mayor, Melih Gök?ek. The capital has seen no sound investment since I left the post in 1993 other than underground passages and junctions. The capital has sunk in an economic and social sense," Karayal?ın said in an interview with Hürriyet Daily News & Economic Review.

"Ankara needs a contemporary municipal understanding and I call for the support and votes of not only leftist parties, but of all Ankara residents regardless of their political affiliation," he said.

Karayal?ın, former chairman of the Social Democrat People's Party, or SHP, will run in the local elections in March from the ranks of the Republican People's Party, or CHP, as a "joint candidate" of SHP and CHP. The leftist political parties want to enter the mayoral race with joint candidates particularly in metropolitan cities as the lack of joint candidates in previous elections strengthened Gök?ek's, and the ruling Justice and Development Party, or AKP's, hand.

The AKP has not announced its nominees yet, but Karayal?ın is expected to be the main rival of Gök?ek, who is most likely to stand as AKP's Ankara mayoral candidate. Gök?ek, who will have completed his third five-year term, previously won two elections against Karayal?ın in 1999 and 2004.

Some residents are still reproaching Karayal?ın, who served as Ankara mayor between 1989 and 1993, for not running in 1994, paving the way for Gök?ek's first mayoral triumph in 1994.

For Karayal?ın, however, it was not him but the leftist political parties that could not produce a joint candidate in 1994, and local elections granted the mayoral post to Gök?ek.

"I was the only candidate from the center-left parties when I assumed the mayoral post in 1989, but in the later local elections of 1999 and 2004 I failed despite my nominations because of the divided leftist votes. So it was not Gök?ek who won the elections but the left-wing political parties who gifted the post to him," Karayal?ın said.

"But the current solidarity and unification with the CHP is a modernizing and prestige project to restore the dignity of capital, which has lost a great deal of blood both socially and economically during the rule of Gök?ek," he added. The move had nothing to do with unifying political parties on the left but was to garner support from a broader audience comprising rightist, leftist and AKP voters to combat Ankara's grave problems in transportation, natural gas, drinking water and its subway, said Karayal?ın, the CHP's only mayoral candidate, who has come up with concrete social and economic projects ahead of the election. Elimination of poverty and the social and environmental rehabilitation of the capital will be his main priorities if elected. Exploring the capital's social and economic potential and encouraging investment in the city will be essential in this respect. "I want to 'prohibit' poverty in Ankara, but I want to do this on a measured basis and with the public's support," he said.

The municipality will provide free services for students and economically disadvantaged citizens whose income is less than YTL 600 a month. The support will not be financial but will aim to meet the vital needs of the poor, such as providing free coal and free bus or subway tickets. Employment projects, creating a friendly social and physical environment where the public can become acquainted with each other and that highlight Ankara as Turkey's most preferred location for education and health will be other important projects. Projects to solve Ankara's water, transportation and natural gas problems are also on Karayal?ın's mayoral to do list. Establishing a purification system, which is transported from the Kızılırmak River, and the construction of a new dam for collecting water from the Gerede River, an alternative project recommended by experts, are some of these projects.