On Sunday, Turkey is marking the 94th anniversary of the foundation of the Republic, a milestone in the country's history.
Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, an Ottoman military officer turned national hero by spearheading the War of Independence after the collapse of the empire, is being commemorated on the occasion. It was Atatürk and a handful of his colleagues who declared the Republic on Oct. 29, 1923.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and state officials, including Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım and his cabinet went to Atatürk's mauseoleum early Sunday to attend a formal ceremony.
The president is expected to receive guests from all corners of Turkey for an event at the presidential complex at Beştepe.
The Turkish presidency is scheduled to host ordinary people who made headlines with their extraordinary feats and heartwarming stories on the occasion of Republic Day, Daily Sabah reports.
Guests include Hamdu Sena Bilgin, an 11-year-old girl whose photo of her and her dog carrying a goat and its newborn babies in backpacks in heavy snow went viral on social media.
A group of miners who refused to sit on the seats of a public bus to avoid dirtying them with their clothes are among the other guests.
Female entrepreneurs, a middle school student who designed a drone detecting buried explosives and a woman who dedicated her life to her handicapped nephew for four decades will be the other guests at the Presidential Complex on Oct. 29.
In an interview with Vestnik Kavkaza, political scientist Togrul Ismail noted that this holiday is a symbol of unity of Turkish people.
"This holiday, the Republic Day, can be called a struggle for national independence. After collapse of the Ottoman Empire, countries that won the World War I occupied Turkey, trying to divide it among themselves, but Turkish people, led by Atatürk, rebelled against them. Turkish Republic was created as a result of this fight for national independence," he noted.
According to him, today this holiday is more relevant than ever, because in the modern world, Turkey once again faces problems that require people to unite, such as terrorism and other threats to national security.
