The election is over, they will forget again

Now that the local elections are over, the editors, reporters, and columnists of the pro-government media can stop writing about and commenting on the 'CHP's money towers' stories.

     Because, although the content may vary, the barrage of accusatory news and commentary, which always targets the same people, is repeated before almost every election; as soon as the elections pass, it is forgotten like a weapon put back in a drawer once it has lost its function.

   Let us recall that before the 2019 local elections, allegations that CHP's Ankara Metropolitan Municipality mayoral candidate Mansur Yavaş had engaged in duplicate collection via promissory notes while working as a lawyer were on the agenda of the pro-government media almost every day.

After the voting on March 31, 2019, the headlines were filled with claims of 'organized irregularities' in the Istanbul elections. Accusations were even directed at individual members of the ballot box committees by name.

    Until the decision was made to repeat the mayoral election in Istanbul, the newspaper Sabah ran daily headlines such as 'FETÖ's finger in the Istanbul election,' '32 investigations into the Istanbul election,' 'The document catching the fraud at the ballot box red-handed,' and 'The theft of the century committed by the CHP.'

     What happened after the June 23, 2019 election, where Ekrem İmamoğlu solidified his victory? The pro-government media completely forgot about the allegations regarding Mansur Yavaş and election fraud. The accused ballot box committee chairs were cleared over time; and so was Mansur Yavaş...

     Before the 2024 local elections, footage of money being counted in a law office during the purchase of the CHP's Istanbul Provincial Building became a convenient weapon for the pro-government media. From a journalistic perspective, there was certainly a situation that needed to be examined, its source questioned, and the reason why the money was handed over in cash instead of being sent via bank transfer investigated.

    But the pro-government media turned this event into a propaganda tool, just like in the previous election, with news and commentary written with the air of a judge. The same pro-government media ignored the questions regarding the incredibly large assets of the AKP's Ankara candidate Turgut Altınok and the allegations that his diploma was fake.

     Naturally, the opposition media covered the allegations against Altınok extensively, but did not dwell in detail on the footage of money being counted at the CHP. Frankly, the opposition media also acted with bias regarding these allegations.

     Now that the election is over, the pro-government media will likely forget the news about the CHP again, but the opposition media should not forget the accusations directed at both sides; it must pursue the truth...

   THE JOURNALIST WHOSE CLAIM DID NOT HOLD UP

   Before the local elections, there was a great deal of speculation about Selahattin Demirtaş's approach to the Istanbul elections. It was written that Demirtaş had sent a letter to the DEM Party; this was denied by the party. It was claimed that he had made offers to the AKP and CHP, but that was not confirmed either.

     Nevertheless, throughout the campaign, the narrative and even news reports that Demirtaş would make a statement were never lacking. However, no one spoke as assertively as journalist Serdar Akinan. On the evening of March 27, four days before the election, Akinan wrote the following on X in summary wrote :

   "Demirtaş is the keystone in this matter. It is certain that he will make a statement hours before the polls open, and this will make it possible for Ekrem İmamoğlu to lose. Just as he gifted him that seat with a single tweet..."

     However, Demirtaş did not make a statement as Akinan claimed; the promise that "it is certain he will make a statement" did not materialize. Akinan later offered a justification for this, but that was not verified either.

     A journalist should not speak so definitively on social media without relying on concrete data or a source. Even on social media, one should be as meticulous as when preparing a news report and should not write without verifying from the source. We cannot afford the risk of mixing predictions and expectations with facts.

       THEY DISTORTED THE DENIAL REGARDING EXPORTS TO ISRAEL

    Those who read and watch pro-government newspapers, television channels, and news sites were not informed that banners reading "Stop trade with Israel" and "End the shame of trade with Israel" were opened at President Erdoğan's rallies in Ankara, Sakarya, and Sultanbeyli. They did not report a single line about the fact that those who opened the banners were hastily detained...

    The pro-government media, which ignores the banners, has not been reporting on the exports to Israel for months anyway; they only publish official statements. Some columnists also contribute to the government's masking efforts by writing in line with those statements. 

     The opposition media, on the other hand, is persistently following this issue; "citizen journalist" Metin Cihan tirelessly tracks, documents, and publishes information about the ships going to Israel. In particular, the Karar newspaper, the Saadet Party's publication Milli Gazete, and the TV5 channel have been closely monitoring exports to Israel and frequently feature them on their front pages.

    Finally, on the evening of March 25, Metin Cihan shared the visual of the TUIK (Turkish Statistical Institute) data for January regarding the goods sent to Israel visual shared. This data spread on the internet in a short time. Based on the image published by Cihan, TV 5 also reported about three hours later: "TUIK data revealed: Exports of gunpowder, weapons, and parts from Turkey to occupying Israel continue in 2024" news published; BirGun and Evrensel also used this news.

    That evening, the news was also asked to AKP İstanbul Provincial Chairman Osman Nuri Kabaktepe, who appeared on Karar TV. Kabaktepe insisted that the image regarding the TUIK data was a "photomontage." 

     But the statement made by the Ministry of Trade towards the evening of the next day statement left Kabaktepe empty-handed. In the ministry's statement, the TUIK image was confirmed, but it was argued that the data did not show exports of gunpowder, weapons, and explosives to Israel, but rather "gel fuel, lighter fluid, spare parts and accessories for smoothbore hunting rifles, and fishing equipment (spearguns, etc.)."

     The majority of the pro-government media followed the line of the Ministry of Trade and the Center for Combating Disinformation, which announced the ministry's statement post did not see it, and those who did, distorted it. Yeni Şafak's headline claim of "3 denials regarding the Israel trade allegation" was not accurate. Similarly, Yeni Akit's report that the exported goods were going to Palestine, not Israel, did not reflect the truth.

Because the ministry ultimately admitted that trade with Israel was continuing.

     Hürriyet, on the other hand, was content with publishing the statement from the Ministry of National Defense as "MSB denies allegations of cooperation with Israel." However, it misled its readers by ignoring the Ministry of Trade's confirmation that exports to Israel were continuing. Moreover, right above the MSB news in Hürriyet, there was a report titled "Most arms sales to Israel are from the US and Germany." Akşam, meanwhile, published a report stating that "British MPs want an end to arms sales to Israel."

     It is like a joke; ignore the reports that weapons are being sent from Turkey and ignore the TUIK data, then go and report on the US, UK, and Germany. Such absurdity is also part of fate when trying to curry favor with the government. 

  A MASTERPIECE OF JOURNALISM BY TRT HABER AND AKŞAM

    TRT Haber and Akşam's report titled "Diplomatic sources: German authorities announced that there is a possibility of arson in the incident" was a true masterpiece of journalism!

    The first oddity was that the source of the news was presented as a "written statement from diplomatic sources." If someone makes a written statement, they put their name on it. Why would the name of the person making a written statement be hidden? There is no logic in hiding the source making the statement.

    The second oddity is that the "statement from diplomatic sources" was actually a statement about a statement from German authorities! The report stated, "In the statement made by diplomatic sources, it was noted that German authorities announced the possibility of arson regarding the fire in Germany in which Bulgarian citizens of Turkish descent died."

    In fact, neither the person who wrote this report nor the one who published it understood or could explain the message of the statement. The message of the statement is hidden in this sentence: "We expect the incident to be clarified and potential suspects to be brought to justice." It would have been more accurate to put this expectation at the beginning, but even then, one should not hide the source, but rather explicitly write it as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

      THE ADVERSE EFFECT OF THE HEALTH SYSTEM ON PEOPLE!

     CHP Bursa Deputy Kayıhan Pala, as a physician, could not remain silent when President Erdoğan praised City Hospitals in his speech on March 14, Medicine Day. In his assessment to Cumhuriyet, he emphasized that these hospitals are inefficient and harmful to public health, stating, "The performance of the health system is very poor."

     He was very surprised to see the same statement on another news site exactly one week later. It was supposedly taken from Cumhuriyet but a completely different language was used in the report. In the report, which was full of absurd expressions such as "Pala, who emphasized that the performance of the health system in Turkey is very poor" and "people cannot get appointments," words that were not in Pala's vocabulary, such as "City Hospital," "Erdoğan's words," "health system," "health workers," and "duration," stood out.

    In the report on the traffic accident in which Tolga Gül, the owner of the Çoruh Postası newspaper on the site, lost his life, the headline "Journalists had an accident: 1 deceased, 1 injured" was used. How many people in this country use the word "meyyit" (an archaic term for deceased) instead of "ölü"? It is a complete Turkish monstrosity.

    I asked site administrator Celal Özdemir why Kayıhan Pala's statement had been altered; he replied, "The news comes to us from bots." He corrected the story after our correspondence. However, it is not right to use news that a computer program pulls from here and there, altering it in this way without verification.

      New technologies called "artificial intelligence" should not open the door to new errors.

In a single sentence:

·         Sabah newspaper supported forgery by reporting a banner reading "No votes for those who stabbed you in the back / Kılıçdaroğlu volunteers" as if it were real, without noting that it was fake and without including Kılıçdaroğlu's statement.

·         Sabah, which did not report on the Turkish Statistical Institute (TÜİK) report "The Elderly with Statistics 2023" that found poverty among the elderly in Turkey is increasing, published a story titled "Number of poor in Germany increased by 1 million," while Hürriyet published a story titled "German economy in collapse."

·         BirGün, Cumhuriyet, Halk TV, and Odatv, by characterizing the remarks of A. Mahmut Ünlü, known as "Cübbeli Ahmet," against the YRP and SP as a "fatwa," elevated Ünlü to the status of an authority capable of issuing fatwas and legitimized the use of religion to influence voters. 

·         Cem Küçük, who did not allow Mehmet Altınöz, the YRP's Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality mayoral candidate, to appear on his program on TGRT despite having invited him, failed to provide an explanation to the viewers and did not apologize to Altınöz.

·         Sözcü published the news of the fire that occurred on March 15 at the million-dollar home of British model Cara Delevingne—which had already appeared in Turkish newspapers the following day—on March 27, 12 days later.

·         IHA distributed a photo showing a person suspected of suicide hanging from a tree in its report titled "A person found hanging from a tree in Aydın," without considering the traumatic impact it would cause; this photo was also used without blurring in local media, including Yeni Asır.

·         Akşam published full-page advertisements disguised as news for the municipalities of Bursa, Fatih, and Gaziantep; Milliyet for Gaziantep; and Yeni Şafak for Bismil, Gaziantep, Pendik, and Uşak.

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