Pro-Government Media Rocked By Top-Level Dismissals

Editors-in-chief of a pro-government media group were sacked on Monday in a mass purge, a move which many believe represents a reckoning within the media group carried out under the auspices of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, given that the owner of the media group is a man known for his personal love for the president.

The head of the Star Media Group, Mustafa Karaalioğlu, and the editors-in-chief of the Star and Akşam dailies, Yusuf Ziya Cömert and Mehmet Ocaktan, respectively, were fired, read a statement released by Murat Sancak, director of the Executive Board of the media group, late on Monday.

Both dailies, which have steadfastly supported the government, are owned by Ethem Sancak, a businessman close to Erdoğan who has freely expressed his love for the president.

“I just love the man [Erdoğan],” he said once to explain his support for the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party), which was at the time headed by Erdoğan.

Twitter user @fuatavni, a government whistleblower who writes under the pseudonym Fuat Avni and who is believed to be a senior government official, claimed that Karaalioğlu was fired because he was deemed to be close to former President Abdullah Gül.

Maintaining that Karaalioğlu had secretly met with Gül at the president's office a couple of days before the end of Gül's term, Fuat Avni said in a Tweet late on Monday, “When the meeting was revealed, it was decided that Karaalioğlu would be sacked.”

In another Twitter message, Fuat Avni further claimed that “[Yiğit] Bulut, who knows well that Karaalioğlu is close to Gül and who always keeps him [Karaalioğlu] under watch, informed the Tyrant [Erdoğan] about the situation whenever he had the occasion.”

Bulut serves as an advisor on economic issues to Erdoğan, who is dubbed “tyrant” by Fuat Avni for Erdoğan's almost complete control over the ruling party and his crackdown on freedoms in recent years.

Oktay Ekşi, a deputy from the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP), also feels Erdoğan may well be involved in the dismissal of top figures in the pro-government media outlets.

“Although it may seem the dismissal was carried out by Sancak, the scope of the dismissal gives the impression that this is the work of a higher will,” Ekşi, who formerly worked for a number of years as a prominent columnist for one of Turkey's leading dailies, told Today's Zaman.

The dismissal of the top executives from the pro-government dailies was announced to the staff of the newspapers by the top managers on Tuesday. The terminations were a result of internal restructuring, the statement said.

Star Media Group Executive Board Director Sancak thanked both Karaalioğlu and Cömert for their service in his column in the Star daily and said the media group had decided to restructure itself in an effort to match Turkey's rising ambitions.

Praising Karaalioğlu's efforts for the transformation of Turkey in the past, Sancak said, “I firmly believe Mr. Karaalioğlu will continue to serve the new Turkey in the future.”

Cengiz Özdemir, head of the Executive Board of Türkmedya, which includes among other media outlets the Akşam daily, said in his column on Tuesday that Akşam has arrived at a turning point from which it would target higher goals.

Thanking the daily's dismissed Editor-in-Chief Ocaktan for his services, Özdemir said the upcoming period would be one of further progress and restructuring for the daily.

Ocaktan, who was a former deputy of the ruling party, served as editor-in-chief of Akşam for the past one-and-a-half years.

The dismissal of Karaalioğlu may also have to do with a financial issue which caused a rift between himself and the media group's boss. Turkish media reports said TL 2 million ($0.9 million), withdrawn for the newspaper's promotion, was wasted by Karaalioğlu and his team. Sancak was also said to be angered by Karaalioğlu's salary, which some claimed was as high as TL 100,000 ($45,000) a month.

But the CHP's Ekşi thinks there must be more to the terminations than just the finances. He said, “If it [the firings] were the result of a disagreement on a financial issue, I believe the issue would have been settled in a smaller operation.”

Sancak is known for his unconditional support for Erdoğan. He reportedly said after Erdoğan was elected president that he is "in love" with Erdoğan and that the president is his "idol." He stated that he became involved in the media business to promote “the mission of the [Justice and Development Party] AK Party."

Yusuf Halaçoğlu, parliamentary group deputy chairman of the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), believes this is just another version of the government's pressure on the media.

“Given the past instances of the government's intervention in the media, the dependability of the media comes more and more under question,” Halaçoğlu told Today's Zaman.

According to Twitter messages by Fuat Avni, the wealth of Karaalioğlu and Ocaktan was brought up and criticized in a meeting possibly attended by leading ruling party officials.

“Yiğit [Bulut], who said it was possible to establish a daily with the money paid to Karaalioğlu and Murat Sancak, who said, ‘The money we are paying this person [Karaalioğlu] goes to waste,' got what they wanted,” Fuat Avni said in a Twitter message.

Karaalioğlu fired Star columnist Cemil Ertem last week for allegedly "orchestrating a defamation campaign" against several people, including himself, with the help of President Erdoğan's chief adviser Bulut and pro-government social media trolls. After being fired, Ertem urged followers on his Twitter feed to reject "thieves in the media and those who rip off their bosses."

"Süleyman, send 2 million, will you?" Karaalioğlu reportedly asked the former chief of the state bank, Halkbank, according to a voice recording that was part of a corruption investigation. He was indelibly tainted thereafter as a media executive who was unable to pay staff salaries and so asked then-Halkbank Director Süleyman Aslan to send him TL 2 million.

Lütfü Türkkan, a deputy from the MHP, claimed in a Twitter message late on Monday that the dismissal was due to corruption on the part of media executives. “The boss realized [that there was corruption], and fired [them].”

Some pro-government columnists have criticized the dismissal of top media executives who were long-time supporters of the ruling party.

Hakan Albayrak, a columnist at Star, reportedly quit in protest of the dismissals.

Nihal Bengisu Karaca, a columnist for the Habertürk daily, criticized the dismissal of the three top media executives at the same time in a Twitter message late on Monday.

Noting that the ruling party officials describe the transformation Turkey has gone through during AK Party rule as a “silent revolution,” Karaca said: “These [three] were the people who offered support to this revolution during hard times. You could have at least saved their honor.”

Aydın Albayrak (Cihan/Today's Zaman)