I am Zafer Aracagök, an academic who was found eligible for support by CARA (Council for at-Risk Academics) and joined the School of Politics and International Relations, University of Kent, as a fellow researcher. I started this position on 17 October 2019. On 21 February 2020, I traveled to Turkey for a short visit as I was in depression as I was not offered convenient grounds to produce my academic activities at Kent. In the mean time Covid-19 pandemic broke out and I couldn’t come back to UK since the flights between UK and Turkey were and are still banned. Now the University and CARA after a long period of interrogation has decided to cancel my contract because I left the UK without a prior notice to the Uni and CARA. Yet even more depressing thing is that they accused me of not having made any academic progress in 4 months of my stay at Kent. In contrast to their view I produced 4 publications in such a short period of time with an album (I am an electronic music artist as well) to be released soon by Obsolete Capitalism in Italy (15th July 2020) and to be distributed by Rough Trade in UK (1st July 2020). And this decision was given by a certain Dr. Anthony Manning (Dean for internationalism whose sole profession is to teach English) at Kent who has no education in philosophy nor politics and therefore who is not in a position to evaluate my academic progress. Now I am left to my own devices in Turkey where I was saved from by the intervention of CARA. I am a well known academic in some certain circles in philosophy and politics internationally which you can check by simply googling my name or visiting my website: www.sifiro.com
I am writing this petition because I believe this is an unjust decision given by the University of Kent, especially by the above mentioned person whom I never met before. It is unjust because I cannot be held responsible for not being able to return to UK in face of such a pandemic, a force majeure, if you like, which has caused lots of restrictions in human lives, including the flight bans between Turkey and UK. I will be grateful if you can sign this petition and help me to raise the tone of protest against this unjust decision which might have been motivated by insidious racism and stupidity, quite prevalent among British people these days.
Regards,
Zafer Aracagök
PLS SIGN THE PETITION @ CHANGE.ORG
