19/10/2026 | Writer: Oğulcan Özgenç
While the allocation for human rights remains at 1.3 billion Turkish lira in the 2027 draft budget, funding earmarked for “women’s empowerment” and “youth” also falls behind the approximately 30 billion lira allocated to “protecting and strengthening the family.”
The 2027 Central Government Budget Bill, which is scheduled to be discussed in TBMM this week, proposes an allocation of 29 billion 989 million Turkish lira for “Protecting and Strengthening the Family” under the section titled “Distribution of Central Government Budget Appropriations by Programme.”
According to the proposal, this allocation is projected to increase to 36 billion 460 million lira in 2028 and 41 billion 187 million lira in 2029.
The 2026 draft budget had proposed an allocation of 21 billion 804 million lira for the same programme. The amount proposed for 2027 therefore represents an increase of approximately 38 percent compared to the previous year's proposal.
The “Protecting and Strengthening the Family” programme was first introduced into the draft budget in 2021. It received allocations of 1 billion lira each in 2021 and 2022, 3 billion lira in 2023, 11 billion lira in 2024, and 16 billion lira in 2025.
Human rights funding is just one twenty-second of the allocation for protecting the family
In the 2027 draft budget, allocations for “Women’s Empowerment,” “Human Rights,” and “Youth” remained below the funding proposed for “Protecting and Strengthening the Family.”
According to the proposal, approximately 11 billion 61 million lira is expected to be allocated to “Women’s Empowerment” in 2027. The estimated allocations for this programme are 13 billion 592 million lira in 2028 and 15 billion 156 million lira in 2029.
The proposed allocation for “Human Rights” stands at 1 billion 346 million lira in 2027. This amount is expected to rise to 1 billion 557 million lira in 2028 and 1 billion 757 million lira in 2029.
For the “Youth” programme, an allocation of 7 billion 646 million lira is proposed for 2027. The projected allocations for the same programme are 20 billion 219 million lira in 2028 and 22 billion 135 million lira in 2029.
As a result, the funding allocated to protecting and strengthening the family in the 2027 draft budget is approximately 22 times the amount earmarked for human rights.
Ministry of Family’s budget set to rise to 677 billion lira
The 2027 draft budget proposes an allocation of 677 billion 303 million lira for the Ministry of Family and Social Services.
The proposed allocations for the Ministry were 531 billion lira in the 2026 draft budget, 407 billion lira in 2025, 334 billion lira in 2024, and 149 billion lira in 2023.
The proposed allocation for the Ministry has therefore increased by approximately 28 percent compared to the 2026 proposal and approximately 355 percent compared to the 2023 proposal.
Budget programme shares its name with the Ministry of Family’s anti-LGBTI+ action plan
The draft budget does not provide detailed information about the activities carried out under the “Protecting and Strengthening the Family” programme. However, this budget and expenditure category shares its name with the Ministry of Family and Social Services’ action plan targeting LGBTI+ people.
In May 2024, the Ministry of Family and Social Services prepared a document titled “Vision Document and Action Plan for Protecting and Strengthening the Family.” The document targeted LGBTI+ people through references to “harmful movements” and a “gender-neutralization project.” One of the plan’s strategic objectives was described as “Strengthening the fight against violence, harmful movements and habits that threaten the family.”
Under this strategic objective, the Ministry stated that an anti-LGBTI+ strategy document would be prepared with the involvement of all ministries, the Presidency of Religious Affairs, and civil society organizations.
The Ministry also stated that, as part of this strategic objective, it would collaborate with universities to conduct “identification and assessment studies on current risk factors threatening the family and society.”
Another activity planned under the action plan targeting LGBTI+ people was described as follows:
“Documentaries and programmes will be produced on the negative effects of harmful movements and habits that threaten families, particularly children, on human nature and rights, family structure, and society. Existing publications will be translated into Turkish.”
Tags: medya, human rights, life, lgbti
