Exactly 100 years ago, on October 28, the great leader of the Turkish people, Gazi Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, gathered the country's officials for dinner at the Çankaya pavilion and uttered the famous words, "Gentlemen, tomorrow we will declare the republic." When the calendar showed Friday, October 29, 1923, Atatürk, who entered the parliament building full of people, after holding several meetings, took the chair of the assembly and announced the Republic of Turkey with the words "Sovereignty belongs to the nation unconditionally".
Those gathered in the building greeted this statement with the slogan "Long live the Republic" and cheers.
After that, the draft law entitled "The form of government of the Turkish state is a republic" and the proposal to elect Gazi Mustafa Kemal Pasha as the first president of the new Turkish state are presented to the Grand National Assembly of Turkey and accepted by the unanimous vote of 158 members of parliament.
If we look at the history, we will see that when the Republic of Turkey was established, the situation in the country was very sad. However, the Turkish people, who believe in the future of the country, are embarking on a great path of development under the leadership of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk.
The state of Turkey, which has been guided by justice, democracy, human rights and equality since its inception, is trying to rapidly develop all areas that meet the needs of the modern world, such as education, transport, sports, infrastructure, and culture.
This path of development, started by Gazi Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, was later successfully continued by several leaders.
Economic policy changes are being made to accelerate growth and promote industrialization in the country. The importance of industrial production and export is increasing. A number of economic reforms and modernization initiatives are being implemented. Issues such as changing the structure of agriculture, developing infrastructure, and creating new industries come to the fore.
In addition to all this, in the last hundred years, the country has gone through many trials, such as military coups, terrorism, economic crises, foreign debts, and natural disasters. After a century of great struggles, today Turkey has become one of the most advanced countries in the world.
When we look at the recent past, we see that the last twenty years under the leadership of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan have been one of the most important stages of Turkey's development. During this period, firsts and huge projects were signed in many fields such as industry, healthcare, culture, transport, communication, infrastructure, tourism, sports and so on.
Considering the importance of the trade area for all countries, last year Turkey's total foreign trade volume reached the highest level in the history of the republic and reached 618 billion US dollars.
Transport is one of the main areas of attention in the country. In the past 20 years, more than 183 billion dollars have been invested in the field of transport and communication. In 2002-2022, the length of the road network in Turkey was increased from 6 thousand 101 kilometers to 28 thousand 986 kilometers. The length of the railway line, which was 10 thousand 959 kilometers in 2002, is now 13 thousand 128 kilometers.
In the past period, great progress was made in the field of air transport. The number of active airports across the country has increased from 26 to 57 in twenty years. The development of the high-speed train network has also been constantly taken into account.
One of Turkey's main development directions in recent years is defense and aviation. In the last twenty years, the ratio of local and national technology in the country's defense industry has increased from 20 percent to 80 percent. Turkey continues technological production in this field, which has amazed the whole world. Today, a lot of equipment such as UAV, SIHA, "Atak" helicopter, "Hurjet", "Kaan" national combat aircraft, "TCG Anadolu" amphibious ship are just some of the works that the country is proud of in this field.
Looking at all this, the brotherly country Turkey, which continues its development in all fields at full speed and is moving towards new goals with great strides, today enters its new century with great pride.
