It was Thursday evening the other day. Dear Cem Kar, who hosts a successful program on Ada TV, had welcomed Mr. Türkay Tokel, the Minister of Labour and Social Security, as a guest. With his distinctive style and probing questions, dear Kar kept pressing Minister Tokel harder and harder. Faced with these questions, Mr. Tokel was practically coming apart. One of our country’s festering wounds is unregistered workers—“illegal workers,” as dear Kar puts it, and “unregistered workers,” according to the Minister. When I turned on the television, I couldn’t watch the program on Ada TV from the beginning, so I didn’t know much about it. I wonder, did he ask even one brief question about the problem of undocumented workers? I don’t know. Did he ask Mr. Tokel what he thought about ending entry to the country with ID cards, and whether his government had considered or raised this issue?
The problem of undocumented workers in our country has become more brazen. Like a wolf that thrives in foggy weather, I understand and respect party members who wait for elections and support the National Unity Party (UBP) in the streets with all their might so it can come to power. I also respect that it won 26 seats and came to power on its own. But do you know what I don’t respect? In particular, people who cannot vote because they are not citizens—in other words, undocumented workers—were happier than UBP members themselves that the UBP had come to power again. Their slogan in particular was, “Now is the time for UBP.” After all, citizens had been promised that things would be done. I consider it abnormal that Turkish workers who have lived in Cyprus for 20 years, whose children were born here, and many of whom are legally resident, are not granted citizenship, while students who have been here for only a few years—and even people granted citizenship before they came to Cyprus—are, and those who have lived here legally for years and have children are not.
It is said that there are 35,000 foreign workers in our country, at least 10,000 of them unregistered—in other words, undocumented. Even the deaf sultan knows they are here. The Minister of Labour and the Minister of Finance have also announced this figure on television programs. During the CTP-DP period, the fight against undocumented workers began, and during the CTP-ORP period it came to a conclusion. Laws were passed to deter undocumented workers who remained in the country and tourists whose visas had expired, and fines were introduced. They brought in the ban, but then began issuing amnesties every year—in other words, a revolving door, a charade meant to fool people by saying, “We’re not letting the undocumented get away with anything.” The UBP came to power. Mr. Türkay Tokel was appointed Minister of Labour, and his first undertaking was to fight undocumented employment. While Mr. Tokel was still new to the job, he did not break with tradition and granted undocumented workers an amnesty. He said it would be the last one. He announced that those who had remained undocumented in the country for years would have their penalties waived if they paid an amount equal to the minimum wage and left within one month, even though they would otherwise have to pay a fine of 50,000 lira. He also said that people leaving the country with penalties against them would have to pay double when they returned, but those arriving could have their penalties waived by paying the minimum wage. Of course, there is no end to the number of people who have incurred penalties. I met with Labour Minister Mr. Tokel several times, full of hope. He told me they had issued their last amnesty and that there would be no more while he remained at the ministry. He also said they would prevent undocumented employment. How? Actually, it’s very simple: end entry using ID cards and see how undocumented employment dwindles on its own. Why? In Turkey, getting a passport costs around 200 lira; on top of that, you have to pay an exit fee when leaving Turkey, and with the cost of a plane or ship ticket, the expenses come to 500–600 lira. Since this is a very large sum in Turkey, fewer people would come. People would only need to buy a ship or plane ticket, put their ID card in their pocket, and carry another 50–100 lira in their wallet. Of course, it would be very easy for them to come. After all, at the crossings nobody asks how much money you have, where you’re going, or where you’ll stay. People beg as they wander around, live in gardens for just enough to eat, or stay in motorhomes—there are so many such cases that Minister of Labour Mr. Türkay Tokel himself has witnessed plenty of these ugly situations. Mr. Tokel was wrong when he said it was difficult to track unregistered workers. After all, taking precautions is very easy. People entering the country are issued visas, and the expiry date is known. By checking the records, undocumented residents can be identified quickly. The matter can be reported to the Ministry of the Interior, and the police or inspectors can send warnings to those people’s addresses. The shortcut is to end entry using ID cards. We should take the immigration laws of countries around the world as an example.
Also, our fellow workers who come from Turkey and remain unregistered are met with inhumane treatment. I have done a great deal of research and reporting on this. I observed the homes they live in and their living conditions, and I was very upset. Some civil servants and shrewd opportunists are taking advantage of the situation: they put up a few shacks and rent them to workers at exorbitant prices, making money off their backs. I felt sorry for the children living in unhealthy, shack-like homes that no one could live in. Mr. Tokel, together with Finance Minister Mr. Ersin Tatar, should hold to account not only the workers they have granted permits to, but also landlords who rent unhealthy rooms at exorbitant prices to people working off the books. Of course, together with officials from the Labour Department and the Tax Department, they should go after such opportunists who evade taxes.
On Ada TV, I listened to Tokel with my eyes closed