Mofak Salman Kerkuklu

TURKMEN SINGER MR.AKRAM TUZLU

 He was born in 1933 in Orta Mahallesi (Orta neighborhood) in Tuz Khormatu; he completed his primary school in 1949 and completed his intermediate school in 1954. [1] He then joined the institute of teaching and graduated as a primary school teacher. The death his father and the necessity to live have lead him to leave the teaching occupation and he worked as a carpenter Tuz Khormatu in order to support a family of eight and working as a carpenter has lasted for a period of two years.

 However in 1960, he re-joined the teaching profession and worked as a primary school teacher in Sulyman Bag village which is linked to the Tuz Khormatu district, his teaching in the village has lasted for three years he then was transferred to Tuz Khormatu and he stayed in Tuz Khormatu after that he was transferred by the government to the sub district of Al-Zab which is linked to district of Debis outside of Kerkuk and he worked as a teacher for a further three years. However, his love of literacy, poems and singing began when he was child, but his involvement in the political activities commenced when he was at secondary school especially when he acted in play and read a poet titled Keel Pasha and he read the following poem: -

كمال باشا

تاج قويموش كمال باشا

توركله رين قره باختين

آغ ايتميش كمال باشا

 When he read the above poem on the school stage in the presence of the Councilor of the Tuz Khormatu as one of the guest at the event. The reading of the above poem by the Ekrem Tuzlu caused anger of the Councilor as a consequence the Councilor had to leave the event. After that, Ekrem Tuzlu was called by the headmaster and was dismissed from the school and then was summoned to the court and was sentenced by sacking him from his job for a period of three days and severely reprimanding him.

 Due to his political beliefs and his nationalist activities in Tuz Khormatu in 1959. The communist activists attacked him while he was sitting with friends in one of the Tuz Khormatu coffee shops. He fought the attacker defending himself but he was stabbed in the head with a dagger by one of the attackers and was transferred to Tuz Khormatu hospital. Then he was again arrested by the authorities and was sentenced for one-month imprisonment. In 1961 he participated in the Turkmen Brotherhood festival that was held in Baghdad and nine of the Iraqi ministers had attended the event and during the event he read very patriotic poems as shown bellow: -  

كمال ده ردي

منده وار كمال ده ردي

استقلال بير كول ايدي

أونودا كمال ده ردي 

After reading the above poems in the festival, he was taken away from the stage by security forces that were present at the event. He was imprisoned, he was subject to beating and torture during the interrogation, and after period, he was released from the prison. The security forces arrested him again in year 1982 when he read the following poems and he was sentenced for two-year imprisonment.  

دليم دليم

كيس قاوون دليم دليم

مه ن  بو ديلده ن  واز كيجمه م

اولورسام دليم دليم

 He was released from prison after completion of his sentence and he was arrested again by the security forces while he was teaching at the Tarik Ben Zeyad school under pretext that he was a member of the Turkish Ultra Nationalist Movement (Turani) and he was kept for a period of two years in the security jail and without being charged. During his imprisonment his family was arrested  [wife, daughter and three sons Shahin at the age of six, Erkan at the age of five, Zynab at the age of four, Yasin at the age of three.

 His wife was pregnant when she was arrested by the Iraqi security forces, then Ekrem Tuzlu family were completely deported to Al_Khinak Prison which is located in the Meysan (Al_Eimara) province in south of Iraq and while she was in a prison she gave a birth for her infant boy named Abbas.

 While the family was in the prison in the south of Iraq he was sentenced by the Saddam Hussein regime to twenty years imprisonment, during his imprisonment at Abu Garib Prison, he was beaten continuously and also was tortured by the Iraqi secret service officials in order to confess and also to provide a name of the Turkmen leaders that are working in the Turani organization, his refusal in exposing and providing names of the other Turkmen activists made the Iraqi secret service torture him on a regular basis and used the following methods on him; utilizing electric shock, electric iron and other torturing apparatus. Akram Tuzlu  involvement in the politics have been reduced dramatically since the removal of the tyrant and almost every individual could defend his nation, as he says in one of his poems: 

يارا دير ا م

ده رديم وار يارا ديره م

بير داملا قانيم قالسا

بير ميلت يارا ديرام

طاوادا اولان ياغدير           بارماغين ورما داغدير

توتدوغوم يولدان دونمه م    نه قده ر   جانيم صاغدير

 Ekrem Tuzlu is the most popular Turkmen singer in Turkmeneli and he brought the happiness, joys and smiles to the face every individual Turkmen and his songs are played in every occupation. Nevertheless, he has played a very affective role in the promotion and defending of the Turkmen culture by fighting for Turkmen rights with his traditional and patriotic songs, which ended him in prison with the previous regime of Saddam Hussein by serving over ten years in Abu Ghraib prison.

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