‘Turkey will enter EU, there is no other way’

Jérôme Bastion is both a journalist and a journeyman by nature. Turkey, however, has tamed the latter by feeding the former. He has been here for nearly 15 years and started a family along the way.

“Here I have found everything I wanted professionally and personally,” Bastion said. “It’s a big, rich and diverse country and has enough jobs to feed my family,” he said, smiling.

Bastion is now working freelance for different media sources in Istanbul, including even the Turkish Radio and Television Corporation, or TRT, as a guest commentator, since the time he has spent here has made him fluent in Turkish.

The African adventure

Bastion was born in Strasbourg in 1964. His father was a teacher assigned to France’s former colonies in Africa, so he spent his childhood in Tunisia and Senegal.

After graduating from journalism school in France, he started working for various TV stations as a cameraman. “I quickly understood that I was not made to stay in France. I took the first occasion to go and work abroad,” he said. “I lived all my childhood abroad so I was not feeling comfortable, in France. I was made for discovering the world,” he said.

He started to work for a French TV agency that focused exclusively on Africa, thereby giving him the opportunity to visit there once a month. However, during that time, Bastion started to feel that TV was not the kind of journalism he was interested in. The realization led him to radio instead, taking him first to Algeria where he spent a year.

It was a dangerous time that Bastion described as “a so-called war between Islamists and the military regime.” He saw many French citizens killed and after escaping a kidnapping attempt in his own home, decided to leave the country and return to France. “Then I started to think about where to go,” Bastion said.

The so-called Islamists and the West

“My radio, the French service, sent me to Turkey for a short report,” he said. He was also asked to find a journalist who could cover Turkey part-time. Because those he interviewed were not qualified, Bastion realized on his third visit that he found the country quite interesting. “So, I said okay, I’ll stay here.”

“I just understood that it was a country moving fast. At that time Turkey had just entered Europe’s customs union; the so-called Islamists, the Welfare Party, had won the big cities, getting into power. At the same time, Turkey was getting close to the EU, so everyone was curious about it.” Bastion said the Europeans had the same fears about Turkey that they had with Algeria. Although the situation was rather different in Turkey, it was still interesting for him to observe.

Turkey through a looking glass

Bastion is based in Istanbul, but he has traveled to other parts of Turkey as well. He has positive impressions from most, but he described the Southeast as a “shock” to him. He said it was shocking when he first went there and still is today. Just a week prior to the interview, he was in rural Diyarbakır. “I felt as uncomfortable as I did when I was living in Africa,” Bastion said.

As a French citizen, he does not feel any different in Istanbul in terms of lifestyle but the conditions of the southeastern parts of Turkey make him feel uneasy. “It is not normal,” he said. “Something must be done.”

On one hand, Turks are very hospitable to foreigners; on the other hand, however, there are certain prejudices. A recent poll said nearly half the population does not want foreigners as neighbors.

“I meet dozens of people everyday, and not just in Istanbul, and they are all friendly and welcoming,” he said, arguing that the survey does not reflect the truth entirely.  Bastion said any similar survey in France would possibly return the same results, as people would not want Arabs, blacks, Chinese or a family with five children as neighbors.

That type of “soft racism” is the same everywhere in the world, he said, arguing that the Turkish case stems from not knowing enough about foreigners. This however, is likely to change rapidly since more tourists are visiting Turkey while Turks are traveling abroad more often, Bastion said.

Inconsistencies with EU accession

On recent political developments in Turkey, he said, “The AKP [Justice and Development Party] government has made Turkey change faster than at any other time in the history of the Republic, except maybe Atatürk’s first period.”

In a professional sense, he is fascinated by how quickly new developments appear in Turkey, unlike European countries. “Okay, you wake up one morning and you have a new currency but here it changes much faster,” he said.

Bastion is more optimistic about Turkey’s EU adventure than most. He understands why Turks are pessimistic. “The people should have been told that it would go slowly,” he said, adding that it is normal to progress slowly.

At the same time, he finds it abnormal for European politicians to object to Turkey’s entry to the EU. “It is stupid, childish, insulting and more importantly, against the agreements they have signed. Everyone knows the negotiations will finish some day. And if they have given their consent to start the accession process of Turkey, they cannot then say, ‘Oh, no, we don’t want Turkey.’”

“Let them speak,” Bastion said. “Just do your homework, and in a few years Turkey will enter the EU. There is no other way.”