Vice President Cevdet Yılmaz attended the opening of an asphalt plant in Bingöl whose capacity had been increased. Yılmaz said that the Provincial Special Administration, which serves 325 villages and 823 hamlets, is responsible for a 4 thousand 757-kilometer road network, and that the facility’s production capacity had been raised to 260 tons per hour.
Yılmaz said the “Terror-Free Türkiye” process would strengthen the investment and confidence environment, and offered assessments regarding ethnic and sectarian conflicts in the region. Yılmaz, who also inaugurated the 8-classroom Ziver Primary and Secondary School in Güveçli village, announced that 18 investments were under way in Bingöl, including 16 schools and 222 classrooms, as well as a 100-bed teachers’ residence and a dining hall for 120 people.
Why it matters
The program in Bingöl shows that rural transportation and education investments are being addressed together on the same local government agenda. This reveals that, for the Provincial Special Administration, which provides services across a broad settlement network, road maintenance and construction capacity is directly linked to the continuity of public services in villages and hamlets. Investments in schools, teachers’ residences and dining halls show not only the opening of new buildings but also that educational services are being planned together with accommodation and nutrition facilities. While Yılmaz’s emphasis on a climate of confidence indicates that infrastructure and education spending in the region is not viewed independently of security policies, the open question is to what extent these investments will regularly improve access to services in rural settlements.