Ethem Nejat or Edhem Nejad (1883 – 28 January 1921) was a Turkish educator, revolutionary and

left communist Left communism, or the communist left, is a position held by the left wing of communism, which criticises the political ideas and practices espoused by Marxist–Leninists and social democrats. Left communists assert positions which they rega ...

politician. Known for his contributions to the modernization of

Turkish education system Education in Turkey is governed by a national system which was established in accordance with the Atatürk's Reforms. It is a state-supervised system designed to produce a skillful professional class for the social and economic institutes of the ...

during his lifetime, he was one of the founders and first general secretary of Communist Party of Turkey. He was assassinated on the shores of the

Black Sea The Black Sea is a marginal mediterranean sea of the Atlantic Ocean lying between Europe and Asia, east of the Balkans, south of the East European Plain, west of the Caucasus, and north of Anatolia. It is bounded by Bulgaria, Georgia, Rom ...

together with

Mustafa Suphi Mustafa Suphi or Mustafa Subhi (1883 – 28 January 1921) was a Turkish revolutionary and communist during the period of dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. Early life Suphi was born in 1883 in Giresun Province, in the Ottoman Empire, now loc ...

and 13 other TKP members.

Biography

Family and Education

His mother's name is Cavide, and his father's name is Hasan. His maternal grandfather Ahmet Cavid Pasha is among the Circassian Community of Union and Solidarity founders. After taking high school education at Üsküdar High, he took his higher education in Trade Academy. He has been in

USA The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

and

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

before

Second Constitutional Era The Second Constitutional Era ( ota, ایكنجی مشروطیت دورى; tr, İkinci Meşrutiyet Devri) was the period of restored parliamentary rule in the Ottoman Empire between the 1908 Young Turk Revolution and the 1920 dissolution of the ...

Teaching Life

Ethem Nejat and school football team players

Ethem Nejat was in France when the

was established. After the establishment, he returned to

Istanbul ) , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = 34000 to 34990 , area_code = +90 212 (European side) +90 216 (Asian side) , registration_plate = 34 , blank_name_sec2 = GeoTLD , blank_i ...

and started working as a teacher. At this time, he was an author at Ottoman Agriculture and Trade Newspaper. His first duty as a teacher started in Alasonya Administrative Directorate in 1909. After one year, he was appointed as school director at a teaching school. After the defeat of

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University) ...

in Balkan Wars, he returned to Istanbul due to territorial losses. In 1913, he was respectively appointed to school directorate in various teacher schools in Bursa and

İzmir İzmir ( , ; ), also spelled Izmir, is a metropolitan city in the western extremity of Anatolia, capital of the province of the same name. It is the third most populous city in Turkey, after Istanbul and Ankara and the second largest urban aggl ...

. In the first days of

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, he was on duty as Director of Education in

Eskişehir Eskişehir ( , ; from "old" and "city") is a city in northwestern Turkey and the capital of the Eskişehir Province. The urban population of the city is 898,369 with a metropolitan population of 797,708. The city is located on the banks of the ...

. He also did voluntary military service for a while during that time. Being Director of Education in

Adana Adana (; ; ) is a major city in southern Turkey. It is situated on the Seyhan River, inland from the Mediterranean Sea. The administrative seat of Adana province, it has a population of 2.26 million. Adana lies in the heart of Cilicia, wh ...

and

during the war, Ethem Nejat was appointed to Education Supervision in Istanbul in 1918 when the war was over.

Political life

Originally a

Pan-Turkist Pan-Turkism is a political movement that emerged during the 1880s among Turkic intellectuals who lived in the Russian region of Kazan (Tatarstan), Caucasus (modern-day Azerbaijan) and the Ottoman Empire (modern-day Turkey), with its aim bei ...

, in 1918, the Ottoman government sent him to Germany, where he became a Communist and participated in the Spartacist German Revolution along with the "Workers and Peasants Party" he formed with Turkish students and workers who were in Germany. This group published the paper ''Liberation''. They were recalled in 1919 back to Turkey, where they changed the party's name to the Turkish Workers and Peasants Socialist Party. Members of this party were eventually going to make the bulk of the

organization of the Communist Party of Turkey. ''Liberation'' was published in Turkey, and Ethem Nejat wrote articles about the proletariat, capital, and class struggle; the paper also had articles about the

October Revolution The October Revolution,. officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution. in the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Revolution, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was a key mome ...

. The Turkish revolutionary

, exiled in

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...

, was planning to get in touch with communist groups in Turkey and form the Communist Party of Turkey by uniting the different communist groups in the country. As Suphi was in Baku, Nejat took the initiative among communists within the nation. This enabled the first congress of the Communist Party of Turkey to be held on September 11, 1920, in Baku, at which Nejat made a speech on the "Workers Struggle in Istanbul". The Turkish Workers and Peasants Socialist Party constituted one of the three major factions of the new communist party. He was elected as the general secretary of the new party. With the Communist Party, Nejat's supporters published the magazine ''Kurtuluş'', which became the party's de facto legal press organ. After several months, the party leaders decided to return to Turkey to join the ongoing struggle. On their way to

Ankara Ankara ( , ; ), historically known as Ancyra and Angora, is the capital of Turkey. Located in the central part of Anatolia, the city has a population of 5.1 million in its urban center and over 5.7 million in Ankara Province, maki ...

to meet

Mustafa Kemal Mustafa ( ar, مصطفى , Muṣṭafā) is one of the names of Prophet Muhammad, and the name means "chosen, selected, appointed, preferred", used as an Arabic given name and surname. Mustafa is a common name in the Muslim world. Given name ...

, they were attacked by the inhabitants of the cities they were passing. Finally, they decided to return to Baku by boat from

Trabzon Trabzon (; Ancient Greek: Tραπεζοῦς (''Trapezous''), Ophitic Pontic Greek: Τραπεζούντα (''Trapezounta''); Georgian: ტრაპიზონი (''Trapizoni'')), historically known as Trebizond in English, is a city on the B ...

. Ethem Nejat and Mustafa Suphi were killed along with 13 comrades on 28 January by Captain Yahya.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Nejat, Ethem 1883 births 1921 deaths 19th-century people from the Ottoman Empire Turkish people of Circassian descent Communist Party of Turkey (historical) politicians Turkish revolutionaries Ottoman military personnel of World War I