The past of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoğlu continues to haunt the presidential hopeful. One day after his university degree was revoked over his illegitimate transfer to Istanbul University from another university, the mayor was detained along with dozens of others in the early hours of Wednesday.
Prosecutors say detentions are part of investigations into wrongdoings involving Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality (IBB) as well as other municipalities, ranging from corruption and bribery in public tenders to recruitment of people associated with the PKK terrorist group to political offices. A total of 106 detention warrants were issued in the investigations and so far, 84 suspects have been detained.
Other high-profile names detained in the investigations are Mehmet Murat Çalık, mayor of Istanbul’s Beylikdüzü district who succeeded Imamoğlu in that tenure in 2019, and Resul Ekrem Şahan, mayor of central Istanbul district Şişli. Murat Ongun, a former spokesperson for IBB who now serves as a close aide to Imamoğlu, was also detained.
The Chief Prosecutor’s Office in Istanbul, which handles several criminal cases involving Imamoğlu, released two separate statements about investigations after the detentions.
One investigation focused on corruption and prosecutors say Imamoğlu and other suspects were accused of “running a criminal organization, membership of a criminal organization, corruption, bribery, fraud, illegally obtaining personal data and corruption in a public tender.” The office’s statement says the investigation stemmed from accounts of eyewitnesses who testified in a notorious “money counting” scandal involving figures from the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP). Imamoğlu, Çalık and Şahan were candidates of the CHP in the municipal elections. Prosecutors last year launched an investigation into a controversial video showing CHP officials counting piles of cash, allegedly money allocated to “buy” delegates to vote for Özgür Özel, the incumbent chair of CHP who was elected to that office in 2023, thanks to a secret campaign in his favor allegedly led by Imamoğlu.
Prosecutors say eyewitnesses in that investigation testified that Imamoğlu and other suspects sought to extort some businesspeople, cooperated with other businesspeople for illicit gains, laundered money using pawns and had “secret coffers” or people hiding money they gained illicitly. Prosecutors who compiled a report based on this investigation found Imamoğlu was head of a criminal gang that has included people close to him since his tenure as Beylikdüzü mayor and recruited those suspects working with him during his previous tenure for IBB, effectively setting up an organization to plot schemes of corruption. The report of prosecutors says that suspects were involved in many public tenders of the municipality’s subsidiaries and engaged in irregularities in those tenders.
“It is understood that members of this organization set up their own companies and shell companies and participated in public tenders of Medya A.Ş. and Kültür A.Ş. (a media company and a company involved in organizing cultural events and publications, respectively, and operated by IBB). They made high bids in these tenders while setting tender pricing themselves, profiting from the tenders. They never completed the majority of tasks required by tenders and in some cases, they concocted non-existent "work" to bill the municipality to enrich themselves and to funnel cash to other activities of the criminal organization,” the prosecutor’s office said in the statement.
The suspects are also accused of illegally obtaining data on residents of Istanbul to use them for their own criminal activities. They are also charged with forwarding advance payments paid by IBB after tenders by the municipality’s subsidiaries Medya A.Ş., Kültür A.Ş., housing company KIPTAŞ and asphalt production company ISFALT to companies owned by Imamoğlu.
On extortion charges, prosecutors say suspects sought bribes from many businesses and issued regulations affecting those businesses through verdicts of municipal assemblies if they refused to pay bribes.
Imamoğlu was also detained in a terror probe by the Chief Prosecutor’s Office. In the same operation, Mahir Polat, deputy secretary of IBB and Şişli Mayor Şahan are among seven suspects. They are accused of aiding the PKK.
The office’s statement said the charges stem from an investigation into a so-called “urban consensus” in which a political party linked to a terrorist group discreetly supported Imamoğlu and other CHP mayors in big cities in the last municipal elections. In exchange, CHP municipalities were accused of hiring PKK-linked people after the elections.
The statement noted that the terrorist group's media affiliates had announced an alliance between the Peoples' Democratic Congress (HDK), an umbrella organization for entities linked to the PKK, and Imamoğlu based on the "urban consensus" approach. In response, simultaneous arrests and detentions were carried out against HDK members across several provinces, particularly in Istanbul, where investigations are still ongoing.
The statement also revealed that some municipal council members and deputy mayors, selected under the CHP lists in last year’s municipal elections, had links to the terrorist group. According to the findings, several individuals were identified as having registered as CHP members just days before the March 31 elections. Among them, 10 people, including Ataşehir and Kartal deputy mayors, as well as eight IBB council members, were found in HDK records and were arrested and detained. Additionally, eight other council members with alleged connections to the terrorist group beyond their HDK affiliation were also arrested. In total, 18 members of the terrorist group have been detained.
The statement further revealed that Imamoğlu, IBB deputy secretary Polat, Şişli Mayor Şahan, Reform Institute President Mehmet Ali Çalışkan, fugitive suspect A.B., who was active in the terrorist group's ideological structure and other individuals participated in the "urban consensus" initiative. Moreover, it was revealed that members and sympathizers of the terrorist group were hired by IBB subsidiaries, including the Istanbul Planning Agency (IPA) and BİMTAŞ. It was concluded that Imamoğlu, along with other suspects, knowingly participated in the "urban consensus" activity, thereby aiding the PKK.
The detention was the last legal blow to Imamoğlu, whose university degree was canceled on Tuesday by Istanbul University because he falsely obtained it. Istanbul University said the degrees of 28 graduates, including Imamoğlu, "will be withdrawn and canceled on the grounds of obvious error," it said on X.
Imamoğlu testified on March 5 after the Chief Prosecutor’s Office in Istanbul launched an investigation into allegations of forgery in his diploma upon tip-offs and a subsequent report by the higher education authority. Though his lawyers insisted on the authenticity of Imamoğlu’s 1995 diploma, investigators questioned how he could transfer to the prestigious institution from a private university not recognized by the Turkish education authority in the year he was transferred. The ruling could deprive him of the chance to run for president, who must have a university diploma, though he can keep his job as mayor. Imamoğlu, who is in his second term as mayor of Türkiye's largest city, is likely to fight the decision in court.
The mayor is the only candidate in a primary of the CHP to pick a name to run in what they hoped would be an early election to oust the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) and its chair, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Imamoğlu's detention took place a few days before the primary. The mayor, already embattled with several lawsuits from insults to corruption of public officials, told the investigators that he enrolled in the Turkish Cypriot university’s business administration department in 1988, and one year later, he found out about “others transferring to universities in Türkiye."
"In 1990, I followed the transfer procedure and applied (for transfer to Istanbul University),” the mayor said in his statement to prosecutors.
He was already entangled with several investigations and trials, such as insulting public officials during a spat over the 2019 municipal elections and a corruption trial involving his tenure as Beylikdüzü mayor. Most recently, he faced a new set of charges after exposing and denigrating an expert witness assigned to cases involving IBB subsidiaries, stoking a defamation campaign about the latter.
