Turkish media reported on Tuesday that 22 suspects were detained in a new wave of operations against alleged corruption at the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality (IBB). All suspects were personnel of the municipality.
Authorities say the suspects are accused of involvement in rigged tenders launched by Medya AŞ and Kültür AŞ, two subsidiaries of the municipality, as well as bribery. Among those detained was Taner Çetin, who heads the municipality’s media and public relations department. Çetin is accused of rigging public tenders launched by IBB, awarding them to companies he had links to and companies that paid bribes. According to investigators, based on reports by the financial crimes investigation unit (MASAK), Çetin excluded companies other than those he had links to from tenders.
Other suspects were identified as a public relations manager of IBB and the deputy mayor of the popular vacation destination Çeşme in the western province of Izmir. Police also raided the premises of a company that was allegedly awarded a contract by IBB in a rigged tender.
Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoğlu, a popular figure in the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), was arrested in March along with dozens of municipality employees and businesspeople on charges of corruption. He is accused of running a criminal organization profiting from rigged tenders and rampant bribery in exchange for building and zoning permits, and awarding tenders.
The CHP has launched rallies and incited riots after Imamoğlu’s arrest. It claims that Imamoğlu’s arrest is politically motivated, as the party had nominated him for the next presidential election. However, the government argues that the CHP’s claim and pro-Imamoğlu rallies are simply an attempt to cover up the mayor’s alleged wrongdoings, which range from rigging public tenders to taking bribes.
Imamoğlu has denied all allegations in his interrogation, but prosecutors point out a wide array of evidence, from financial irregularities to bribes and money laundering activities. Those include reports from MASAK, technical surveillance data and testimonies from dozens of witnesses.
Imamoğlu is named as the leader of the criminal network and the “managers” of the network are identified as Murat Ongun, former head of Medya AŞ, Tuncay Yılmaz, who heads a construction company owned by Imamoğlu’s family, as well as Ertan Yıldız, a director of IBB’s subsidiaries, and Fatih Keleş, general manager of a sports club owned by the IBB. Yıldız recently agreed to collaborate with authorities and confessed to wrongdoings. He told prosecutors that under Imamoğlu’s tenure, most public tenders launched by IBB were awarded to firms based in Beylikdüzü or related to that district, which Imamoğlu ran as mayor before his election to IBB in 2019. He said Imamoğlu also handed over a lucrative contract to a company run by Murat Gülibrahimoğlu, a fugitive businessman. The contract involved earthmoving operations across the city, where construction barely stops. Yıldız said the operations raked in revenues amounting to $200 million and could be handled by an IBB subsidiary, but Imamoğlu granted it to Gülibrahimoğlu’s company, in which he was secretly a business partner. He said the company resorted to shady practices such as double billing and fake invoices to further boost the income that was later transferred abroad.
He claimed Imamoğlu also reaped benefits from granting permits to buildings overlooking the Bosporus, with exquisite views of the waterway. Yıldız said Imamoğlu ordered two hotels expanding their premises in Bosporus skylines to pay $27 million, effectively overlooking illegal expansion. He said most payments or bribes were collected by the brother of Fatih Keleş and accumulated in an office owned by Keleş. He stated that Imamoğlu was aware and in control of the money flow. He also said Imamoğlu told IBB officials that they were under surveillance, about eight months before the anti-graft operation led to his arrest.
