The ninth meeting of the series will be held in Bursa on Sunday, April 1, 2012.

ANKARA – The next stop of the Constitution Platform Citizens’ Assembly series launched with the slogan “Turkey Speaks” will be Bursa. The ninth meeting of the series carried out with the participation of citizens will be held on Sunday, April 1, 2012.

The series is presented by the Constitution Platform initiative group, made up of thirteen professional organizations and trade unions. The Group, which was started with the motto “Turkey Speaks” with the secretariat of TEPAV, will hold broad-participation meetings in several cities throughout 2012. The Group, which aims to reach hundreds of participants with each meeting, will be the biggest event for deliberative democracy in Turkey.

The first meeting of the series was held in Ankara on January 8, 2012, followed by meetings in Konya, Edirne, Diyarbakir, Izmir, Antalya and Samsun.

Also, a special meeting was held in Ankara with the participation of women on the International Women’s Day, Thursday, March 8, 2012.

Invitations are sent via text messages to randomly selected citizens. Civil society organizations are called with open invitation. In the context of the series, a special meeting was held in Ankara with the participation of women on the International Women’s Day, Thursday, March 8, 2012 and in Samsun on March 25, 2012 with the participation of the youth.

The meetings which host hundreds of citizens start with opening remarks by TOBB President M. Rifat Hisarcıklıoğlu and Parliament Speaker Cemil Çiçek. The opening ceremony is attended also by representatives from professional organizations, union confederations and civil society organizations as well as Constitutional Committee member MPs. The framework to be drawn throughout the citizens’ meetings is expected to contribute to the establishment of consensus within the Turkish National Assembly.