Pro-Gov't Daily: Erdoğan Will Lead A Friday Prayer In New Mosque

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan will lead a Friday prayer in the newly inaugurated mosque located in his controversial presidential palace in Ankara, columnist Sinan Burhan from the pro-government Yeni Akit daily claimed in his Tuesday column.

Erdoğan inaugurated the new mosque ahead of the weekly prayer service last Friday. The president, who has been accused of squandering state resources by building the grandiose 1,150-room presidential palace, dedicated the mosque to the people at the opening ceremony, naming it Beştepe People's Mosque.

Saying he personally attended the inauguration ceremony held for the new mosque in Ankara last Friday, Yeni Şafak columnist Burhan noted in his column there was a missing piece during the opening ceremony of the new mosque: Erdoğan leading the Friday prayers himself.

“I thought it would be better if the Friday prayers were led by our esteemed president who we know has great religious knowledge. Then, I made a small enquiry and discovered that our president will lead a Friday prayer in the future. Our friends close to the palace have not denied this information,” Burhan wrote in his column on Tuesday.

Drawing a parallel between Erdoğan and the 34th Ottoman sultan, Abdulhamid II, in his column, Burhan said: “The opening ceremony brought to my mind Abdulhamid II. They [enemies] also struggled with this grand sultan. English, Westerners and their supporters [in the Ottoman Empire] called him the ‘Red Sultan.' However, history has shown he was one of the biggest sultans of the Ottoman Empire. He stood firmly against Zionism. Erdoğan is just like Abdulhamid II. He [Abdulhamid II] used to appear in ‘Cuma Selamlığı' [Friday divine service parade]. Maybe Erdoğan will do the same thing.”

Cuma Selamlığı is the old Ottoman tradition during which Ottoman sultans met with representatives of various segments of society to hear their problems following Friday prayers each week.

The new mosque is one of the largest in the capital, constructed on an area measuring 5,377 square meters. It is located in the presidential palace but has an entrance for the public. Consisting of three levels, including a basement, a prayer hall and a gathering section, the mosque has four minarets that reach a height of 60 meters. The mosque can accommodate 3,000 worshippers. It is the largest in Ankara after the Kocatepe and Ahmet Hamdi Akseki mosques.

Erdoğan has dismissed criticism over his expenditure on the massive complex and recently moved away from calling it a "palace," using the term "presidential complex" instead. He insists the complex belongs to the people and that he is its "temporary occupant." Officials have said a congress hall and one of Turkey's biggest libraries, which are currently under construction, will also be open to the public at the site.

Name of presidential palace officially changed to ‘külliye'

The President's Office has changed the name of the presidential palace to “presidential külliye” on its official website.

The word “külliye” was mostly used in Ottoman times to refer to a complex of buildings around a mosque that is generally run by a foundation for charitable purposes and is derived from the Arabic word "kull," which means all.

President Erdoğan had also earlier proposed a new name for university campuses, saying it would be better if the Turkish word “kampüs,” derived from the French word “campus,” was replaced with külliye. “We just had a discussion with the education minister about the word kampüs. Should this be the word? … I thought of revisiting our history and felt külliye would be better. It would be a first in this new period,” he said when attending a ceremony marking the opening of a new campus for Yıldırım Beyazıt University in Ankara on Jan. 7.

Constructed inside the protected Atatürk Forestry Farm (AOÇ) last year on an area of 300,000 square meters as a “Prime Ministry building,” the presidential palace -- dubbed “Ak Saray” -- has been the focus of strong criticism in both the domestic and international media for its high costs and dubious legality.

(Cihan/Today's Zaman)