Special Report: Turkey Stray Dog Dilemma | Pt. 2

You can listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and all the other podcast platforms. New episodes post every other Tuesday.

Solving For Turkey’s Stray Dog Overpopulation While Embracing Its History

About The Episode

To note: Please make sure to check out Part 1 of the special report before listening to this episode!

Residents in Turkey have been living alongside dogs and cats on the streets for centuries. While some people do have dogs as pets these days, the majority of these animals still share the streets with everyone else. Really, they could even be considered citizens, who have had protections granted over recent years.

The new 2024 so-called ‘massacre law’ is threatening to change this historical way of life, however. Ahmet Senpolat, who started the country’s first animal rights federation (HAYTAP), is one of the people who feels this would be a fundamental misstep in removing a part of what makes the country – and Istanbul especially – so unique.

In other parts of the world, such as in the West, there are strict leash laws and almost exclusively a dog-ownership paradigm. In Istanbul, dogs are hanging outside cafes, on public transportation, and all across the city. Residents and workers help take care of them, like making sure they’re fed. This alternate way of living has been inspirational to many, such as filmmaker Elizabeth Lo who filmed her documentary Stray there and had to re-evaluate her perspective on how human-dog relationships are supposed to be in society.

However, despite this being a point of national pride as something that makes Turkey different, the current government by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan sees it as a failure to appear like a “developed country.” So instead, animal rights activists say that his party has sensationalized the idea of stray dogs causing harm to people – using a small number of stray attacks and accidents, which are caused by the municipalities driving these dogs out of their natural environments in city centers, and making it seem like a bigger trend.

It is under the guise of protecting civilians that the government is trying to justify and promote the new legislation passed by the Turkish Parliament this summer, which calls to remove stray dogs from the streets by 2028 – many of whom are likely to be euthanized if there are no changes to the law and process. Mass protests, such as on September 1st in Istanbul, have happened to call for the law to be reversed and reject this proposed treatment.

Animal rights advocates agree that there’s an increasing overpopulation of stray dogs in Turkey that needs to be addressed. But this new law is not the solution. All they need to do is look back at 2004 – when the country first imposed a catch, neuter, vaccinate, and neuter or spay method – to see a plan they already had in place before. And to recognize that the reason municipalities were eventually not able to keep up was due to a lack of resources, budget, staff, and proper support.

So twenty years later, the government should want to learn from past mistakes and address overpopulation not with this new harmful law. For example, one obvious area is the lack of shelter space (and poor conditions), covering less than 3% of the estimated four million stray dogs. Or having enough veterinarians able to help out, which currently only have a quarter amount of workers needed to sufficiently help with vaccinating and neutering or spaying. Even vets who have just graduated could help out, as the government already offers one-year post-grad work assignments for other doctors. International volunteers would also be interested to come and support these efforts, especially with the dogs’ lives at risk.

The individuals and organizations who advocate for stray dogs in Turkey have many ideas and ways to combat overpopulation in a way that focuses on health and safety for everyone, including stray dogs. However, their concerns and strategies have yet to be listened to by the government, let alone implemented. These are passionate people who want to help. It’s time for President Erdoğan to open his doors to them, find a new path forward outside of the massacre law, and honor the inspirational way of life that Turkey has kept alive after all these years.

About The Guests

Nazlan Ertan is a journalist and communication specialist, who has worked in Turkey and abroad since 1990 for both local and international publications. This included more recently serving as culture editor for Al-Monitor. She has also worked as a media and political consultant.

Lisanne Hillen is a Dutch citizen who spent much of her life in the UK before deciding to move to Turkey in 2018 to live with her husband in his homeland. When making the move, Lisanne knew she wanted to help the local dogs. She founded Melez Dog Rescue, where she cares for dogs prepares them for international adoptions - with around 300 dogs successfully matched to date.

Elizabeth Lo is an award-winning non-fiction filmmaker, who attended NYU Tisch School of the Arts and Stanford University. She’s originally from Hong Kong and is currently based in Los Angeles. As a director, cinematographer, and editor, she is interested in finding new aesthetic ways of exploring the boundaries between species, class, and unequal states of personhood. Her debut feature film was Stray, a documentary looking at the life of several street dogs in Istanbul.

Ahmet Senpolat is an animal rights lawyer and is the founder of HAYTAP, the first animal rights federation in Turkey, which now has around 2,500 animal rescue and rights associations as members. He was instrumental in getting free range dogs classified as beings and protected from harm with criminal time in jail for violators. He and other members at HAYTAP have been looking at humane alternatives to solve the dog over population issue.

Featured Links

InterviewJack Sommer