In the investigation targeting Ataşehir Municipality, the contractor who became a confessor: I gave a 10 million dollar bribe.

21.04.2026 20:25

A businesswoman detained in a bribery investigation targeting Ataşehir Municipality became a confessor by benefiting from the provisions of active remorse. The suspect claimed in her statement that for the renovation permit of a construction she started in Yenisahra in 2021, she was asked for 2 million dollars upon the request of Mayor Onursal Adıgüzel. The businesswoman alleged that during this process, she gave bribes piece by piece, totaling approximately 10 million dollars.

The investigation initiated by the Istanbul Anatolian Republic Chief Public Prosecutor's Office into allegations of bribery, "forming, managing, and being a member of an organization for the purpose of committing crimes," and "tampering with tenders" continues. The allegations concern Ataşehir Mayor Onursal Adıgüzel, deputy mayors Birkan Birol Yıldız, Orhan Aydoğdu, and Oğuz Kaya, as well as unit managers and personnel, regarding bribery in tender, zoning, and occupancy permit procedures.

"HE SAID IT WAS THE MAYOR'S REQUEST, THAT 2 MILLION DOLLARS WAS DEMANDED"

In the investigation, businesswoman H. Ö., who was detained, claimed in her statement under the provisions of active remorse that she was extorted for bribes during the construction of a building she started in 2021 as Blocks A and B on the side road of the D100 Highway in Yenisahra Neighborhood.

H. Ö. said, "While constructing this building, I asked the municipality if there was a good architect dealing with these matters. They told me that an architect named E. Ç. was good at his job and could handle it, so I agreed with E. Ç. on the authorship of the project. By 2024, the construction had reached a certain level. In 2024, we needed to obtain a building modification permit, and that's how the process started. E. Ç. told me that the Mayor requested it for the building modification permit and that 2 million dollars was demanded. I asked him why I should pay this money since I had no extra square meters, we were building 130,000 square meters, and we were even 600 square meters short. He told me, 'If we don't give this money, they won't give us the modification permit. If you have time, wait, you won't get the modification permit in 2 years.' I resisted for about 6 months, but as E. Ç. said, when the process dragged on, I had to give the amounts E. Ç. demanded."

"HE ASSUMED THE ROLE OF A PERSON MEDIATING BRIBES BETWEEN THE MUNICIPALITY AND CONTRACTORS"

Suspect H. Ö. stated that before starting the aforementioned construction, she wholeheartedly wanted to undertake a project for Ataşehir Municipality and discussed this with municipal officials, who asked her to take on the Yenisahra Football Stadium and the 2nd Stage of the Kurbağalı Creek Life Valley.

Expressing that she made these investments sincerely, H. Ö. said, "I thought that doing these things would prevent any demands from me, but the process didn't develop that way. In fact, E. Ç. said, 'What you did has no meaning. If we don't give money, we can't get what we want from here.' When E. Ç. started working with me, his financial situation was not good. After the 2024 municipal elections, E. Ç. transformed from an architect more into a person mediating bribes between the municipality and contractors. He also earned significant income from this."

H. Ö. claimed that E. Ç. had a very good relationship with Mayor Onursal Adıgüzel and Birkan Birol Yıldız and acted on their behalf, noting that she met Adıgüzel at a stadium opening after the elections.

"THEY ALWAYS WANTED THE MONEY IN DOLLARS, EUROS, OR POUNDS"

Suspect H. Ö. claimed that she gave E. Ç. approximately 4.5 million dollars in installments for building modification permits and the occupancy permits for Block B and Block A.

H. Ö. asserted that these amounts were delivered to E. Ç.'s man, F. V., by her accountant and brother, saying, "Our office and E. Ç.'s office are in the same building. About a year ago, he rented an office in the same building as ours. His previous office was at a construction site named B. Part of the money was delivered at that office, part at the new office, and part at our office by hand. They always wanted the money in dollars, euros, or pounds. I kept a list of the money I gave to E. Ç. to give to Mayor Onursal and Birkan Birol. I have already shared this with the security units. E. Ç. said they delivered the money we gave to Birkan on the same day. In fact, E. Ç.'s man, F. V., told me that one of the payments we made was delivered to Birkan's house in the evening one day later, and because of this, Birkan got angry and asked why they brought the money late."

Suspect H. Ö. listed the amounts she claimed to have paid for the modification permit and occupancy as follows: "On 08.11.2024, 375,000 dollars for the modification permit; on 29.11.2024, 32,160 dollars for the modification permit; on 03.12.2024, 662,038 dollars for the modification permit; on 05.12.2024, 362,000 dollars for the modification permit; on 16.12.2024, 150,000 pounds for the modification permit; on 16.12.2024, 180,000 euros for the modification permit; on 16.12.2024, 460,000 dollars for the modification permit; on 24.12.2024, 220,000 dollars for the modification permit; on 24.02.2025, 500,000 dollars for Block A occupancy; on 26.04.2025, 125,000 dollars for Block A occupancy; on 04.06.2025, 30,000 dollars for Block A occupancy; on 25.06.2025, 24,993 and 25,000 dollars for Block A occupancy; on 27.06.2025, 10,000 dollars for Block A occupancy; on 09.08.2025, 100,000 dollars for Block A occupancy; on 13.11.2025, 250,000 dollars for Block B occupancy; on 05.12.2025, 500,000 dollars for Block B occupancy; and on 08.01.2026, 250,000 dollars for Block B occupancy, totaling 3,926,191 dollars, 180,000 euros, and 150,000 pounds."

"I PAID THE MUNICIPALITY'S DEBTS"

H. Ö., who said the building modification permits did not come out for 6 months, stated, "We understood that these wouldn't happen if we didn't meet E. Ç.'s demands. I was giving the amounts E. Ç. wanted to E. Ç. E. Ç. said he took this money to Birkan and Onursal. I am not like other contractors. I go to the municipality and follow up on my own work. I used to go to the municipality very often. In fact, Birkan would joke with me, 'Sis, you couldn't become a big contractor; you come to the municipality every day like a project follower.' They wanted to keep me away from the municipality. But I persistently went to the municipality to get my work resolved."

Suspect H. Ö. continued her statement as follows: "After the building modification permits were obtained, the occupancy process for the block where the hospital is located began. Ataşehir Municipality charged me a total of 265 million TL in fees for both blocks. I thought they overcharged this fee. I calculated it too. I saw that they really overcharged it, but they said they legalized it by taking a council decision. For the building modification permits, they also took nearly 70 million lira extra from me, which I also determined. I submitted a petition to the municipality about this last week; the municipality can be asked. In fact, after I made this application, E. Ç. questioned me, 'You probably don't want the occupancy permit, why did you make such an application?' I told them that because I gave the bribe they wanted, I had no money left, I couldn't pay my occupancy fee, I wanted to pay the bribe they wanted by check, otherwise I couldn't pay the official fee. They then told me to give the bribe amount they wanted, that they couldn't take it by check, to pay part of the fee, and for the remaining part, they would consider it paid if I gave checks to the companies the municipality owed money to."

ALLEGATIONS ABOUT MAYOR ADIGÜZEL

H. Ö, conveying that he said to Mayor Adıgüzel, "I gave all the money you wanted, but you are not giving me my occupancy permit," stated, "He told me there was a problem related to expropriation, that they had spent the expropriation money, and that if the expropriation money had not been spent, he would not care about my tears. He even told me, 'If we give the occupancy permit here, it will cause public damage.' I said, 'I am not a State Institution, I have done everything requested of me. I also deposited the requested guarantee for the expropriation. If you had done the expropriation, it would not concern me.' He then spoke to me in a threatening manner, saying, 'You are a contractor, you constantly work with municipalities, it concerns you, if this issue is not resolved, how will you work in other places?'"

H. Ö said, "When starting this project, the municipality requested a letter from the Real Estate Expropriation Directorate for a guarantee for the parcel they would expropriate for the precedent transfer. A parcel needed to be found for the precedent transfer; the Real Estate Expropriation Directorate wrote to us about which IBB parcels would be expropriated and what their price would be. Accordingly, we deposited the requested amount. After Onursal Adıgüzel was elected mayor, he spent this expropriation fee we had deposited. However, when we deposited this money, we deposited it as an expropriation fee and into the expropriation account. I don't know how they spent this money."

Describing the ongoing tensions with the mayor and administrators, H. Ö said, "I obtained the occupancy permit for Block A in a push-and-shove manner. One day before or on the same day I got the occupancy permit for Block A, Construction Control Manager Mrs. A. told me the presidency had a request and gave me a note. The note requested the purchase of phones and iPads. I bought these phones and iPads and delivered them to Mrs. A. We had submitted the invoices for this to the police. Before the occupancy permit process for Block A, I don't remember the exact date, it might have been during Ramadan, Y., an employee of E. Ç., came to the office and said the municipality wanted gift cards and Boyner gift cards. We bought 150 A-101 cards for 150,000 TL. We bought approximately 150-200 Boyner cards for 629,375 TL."

H. Ö, stating that E. Ç also claimed that Onursal Adıgüzel asked for money during the occupancy permit process for Block B and continued to demand money from him, alleged that he gave 1 million dollars in three installments and that an extra payment was demanded from him due to them not carrying out the expropriation.

"THEY ALSO DEMANDED AN EXTRA PAYMENT DUE TO NOT CARRYING OUT THE EXPROPRIATION"

H. Ö alleged, "As if the money they took from me wasn't enough, they also demanded an extra payment due to not carrying out the expropriation. I would like to tell the story of this as well. Because they spent the guarantee I paid in 2024, they took a council decision again. The council decision was about having an appraisal done, determining the current value of the place, carrying out the expropriation based on this, calculating the current value of the money I paid on time, and making a payment according to the resulting difference. They did the calculation. I came out as a creditor of 90 million TL. After that, they gave up on implementing this council decision."

H. Ö, describing how Deputy Mayor Oğuz Kaya called him, stated, "While I was a creditor, they made me a debtor. Oğuz said I needed to pay an additional 126 million TL. I shouted at Oğuz that I could not pay this money, that I had given a total of 10 million dollars including fees and requested bribes, that no one at the municipality looked me in the face, that everyone would account for this, and that I would not give another cent."

Stating that he decided to file a complaint after these events, H. Ö spoke as follows: "For one last attempt and to secure myself, I called E. Ç to my side, said I was very tired of these affairs, and that if they wrote my fees and social security document, I would give them the money they wanted. He insisted, 'Sister, we can provide these, but can you give the money on the same day, in euros, not dollars?' I told him I would give them the 3 million 500 thousand euros they wanted. Upon this, the social security document was written. I was happy that we would pay the fees, but when we checked the accrual slips, we saw there was no such accrual slip or fee in the system. We understood they had prepared and given us fake accrual slips. We even noticed that on one of them, an accrual slip issued in the name of Ö. A. was typed over and our square meters were written on it. When I understood this situation, I got very angry. During this process, the municipality's public works department sent us a letter claiming there was a missing garbage container during inspections at our site and that it needed to be purchased. Based on these letters, we paid for these garbage containers from the companies specified by the municipality, but the garbage containers never came to us. I later learned this was also used as a method to conceal the money they would take."

H. Ö concluded his statement as follows: "Because I told what I know in this file, I am being threatened by the CHP administration. They are pressuring me to change my statement with threats to stop my work. While I am giving my statement here, I learned that municipal police have come to my construction site in Ataşehir. I am under pressure to change my statement, and I am also concerned about the safety of myself and my family. I would like to state this matter as well. I have told everything I know."