Meral Akşener announced that the roadmap of the Meral Akşener Foundation is “the struggle against class inequalities.” In a message published on the foundation’s social media account, Akşener stated that its founding purpose is to expand the opportunities that would allow every child to achieve their dreams.
Human dignity came to the fore. Emphasizing the understanding of upholding human dignity within the state tradition, Akşener recalled Bilge Kağan’s words in the Orkhon Inscriptions, “I fed the hungry people, I clothed the naked people,” and Şeyh Edebali’s counsel, “Let the people live so that the state may live.” This is how the state tradition endured. She stated that this heritage transformed from the Seljuk caravanserais to the Ottoman civilization of foundations and, with the Republic, into the responsibility of becoming “the protector of the helpless.”
Akşener said that she owed the fact that a girl born in the Gündoğdu village of İzmit could reach the highest offices of the state to the Republic’s equality of opportunity. She attributed this to the Republic’s equality of opportunity. She noted that class inequality lies at the root of issues ranging from inequality of opportunity in education to the employment problems of young people. There was also violence against women. Violence against women and deep poverty were also assessed, in this context, as among the fundamental problems caused by class inequality. This was the foundation’s starting point. Akşener emphasized that the foundation was born of the desire to turn this struggle into an institutional will and that its fundamental aim is “not to surrender the dreams of any of our children to impossibility.”
Why it matters
A figure who has risen to the highest offices of the state declaring class inequality the central issue of her foundation means that problems usually debated under separate headings — inequality of opportunity in education, youth unemployment, violence against women and deep poverty — are being tied to a single root cause. This framework turns the young people, women and impoverished segments directly affected by these issues into the foundation’s natural constituency. The references stretching from the Orkhon Inscriptions to the Ottoman foundation civilization indicate that the demand for social equality is intended to be presented not as part of contemporary ideological polarization but as a continuation of a deep-rooted state and solidarity tradition. Akşener’s presentation of her own biography as an example of the Republic’s equality of opportunity signals that the foundation will adopt a discourse combining personal narrative with social claims. Since the statement includes no concrete projects, resources or timeline, the question of by what means these goals will be put into practice remains unanswered for now.