The Turkish Ministry of Interior usurped the will of the people and appointed trustees to the Metropolitan Municipalities of Mardin (Mêrdîn), as well as the municipalities of Batman (Êlih) and Halfeti (Xelfetî). The three municipalities were legitimately run by the Peoples' Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party), which had won the elections on 31 March 2024.

 Civil society organisations and politicians reacted against the usurpation of municipalities and appointment of trustees on social media.

ÖHD (Association of Lawyers for Freedom): The will of the people has been usurped through the appointment of trustees. We will follow every stage of the process against the unlawful, unjust and usurping practices seeking to usurp the will of the people. The will of the people cannot be usurped!

Diyarbakır Bar Association: We call for an end to the unlawful investigation procedures and never to resort to the trustee practice.

Women Strong Together Platform: The trustee regime is a usurpation of the people's will, an attack on women's achievements! We will not allow the trustee regime!

DEM Party Youth Centre: The state mind that appoints trustees to the municipalities of Kurdistan's cities will meet the resistance of the Kurdish people and their friends. We call on all our people and patriotic Kurdistan youth to protect their will. Everywhere Van, everywhere resistance!

TJA (Free Women’s Movement): It is persecution and violence inflicted on the co-mayors, who were elected by women with great will, through a coup d'état. We did not bow down to the putschists yesterday and we will not bow down today. We will take back what is rightfully ours from you under any circumstances. Women will stay and you will go!

Hatice Deniz Aktaş, Co-Chair of the Socialist Party of the Oppressed (ESP): If no action is taken against the trustees appointed to the will of the Kurdish people, the oppression, cruelty and exploitation of Turkish workers, labourers and the oppressed will increase. The day is the day to send the trustees all together!

Purple Solidarity: We will repel every coup against the people! Batman Co-Mayor Gülistan Sönük calls on the people to unite and struggle against the trustee theft. We stand with the Kurdish people and the municipalities that were left by the trustees with millions of debts and plunder and won back with the highest vote rates! No Pasaran to the Trustees!

Doğan Hatun, Co-Mayor of Amed (Diyarbakır) Metropolitan Municipality: Those who set their eyes on the will of our people should know that we are a people who have never kneeled throughout history. While even your ruling is not legitimate, targeting the will of the people will only hasten your end. The trustee practice that ignores the people is not a measure but a coup. This people will not bow down to coups just as they did not bow down to coups before.

Serra Bucak, Co-Mayor of Amed Metropolitan Municipality: On the anniversary of the 4 November 2016 political coup, the trustees appointed to Mardin, Batman and Halfeti and the understanding that insists on this practice should know that you cannot bring the peoples to their knees. The will that emerged from the ballot box in the local elections is the will of the people and it should not be forgotten that no matter how much antidemocratic practices and pressures increase, Kurdish and Turkish people will definitely put a stop to this order and this course. No pasaran to the trustee.

Neslihan Şedal, Co-Mayor of Van Metropolitan Municipality: The mindset that feeds on deadlock has once again come into play and the will of the people has been disregarded again. The trustee usurpation is the name of a new lawlessness. It is a method that has been tried many times but without any result. The will of the people cannot be usurped through these rotten methods, the will of the people cannot be mortgaged. We do not accept this lawlessness. The municipalities elected by the people belong to the people. We will not surrender to this attempt seeking to deprive the people of their will!