MKTV, Müslim Sarı and a necessary article

When I entered the Karum Business Center, known as Ankara’s first shopping mall, memories began to dance in my brain and heart. 

Whenever I step into this building, I remember my days as a reporter for Sabah and Atv. 

Memories... Memories... Memories... 

The Ankara bureaus of Sabah Newspaper and Atv News, which once left their mark on Turkish journalism, were on the sixth floor of the Karum Business Center. (Between 1996 and 2004, I worked at the Karum Business Center as a Diplomacy Reporter for Sabah Newspaper and a Parliamentary Reporter for ATV. At that time, the newspaper and television station belonged to Dinç Bilgin. When Dinç Bilgin went bankrupt, management passed to Turgay Ciner, but due to the foolish practices and pressures of the Ciner administration, a group of friends and I were forced to leave Sabah and ATV.)

In my book titled “Let Us Not Ask That Question,” I wrote very striking stories about those days... 

The Ankara bureau of Mavi Karadeniz TV (MKTV) was also on the fifth floor of the Karum Business Center. I had come to MKTV as a guest on journalist Fatih Ertürk’s program. As soon as I got off the elevator on the fifth floor, there was a sign belonging to Nurol Holding on my left and a Foundation sign on the right. I checked the door number and rang the bell with the foundation’s name on it. Fatih Ertürk, with whom I had chased news stories together for many years, opened the door with his usual smiling face and invited me in. 

Fatih, who has continued his journalism career as a television programmer for a long time, had started producing programs at MKTV after stints at Halktv, TELE1, and Flash TV.

We sometimes talk about domestic politics on our programs with Fatih, but we mainly discuss colonial mining, plunder-and-loot mining, and the ruthless destruction of nature in Turkey’s living spaces. And my harsh criticisms have occasionally taken their toll on Nurol Holding as well. This is because TÜMAD Mining Company, owned by Nurol Holding, has two active cyanide gold mines: one at the summit of Mount Madra, the “İvrindi Gold Mine,” and the other at the top of Çanakkale-Lapseki, the “Lapseki Gold Mine.” TÜMAD also purchased the Kirazlı-Balaban Gold Mine site in the Kaz Mountains ecosystem, which the Canadian company Alamos Gold was forced to abandon, for 1 billion dollars. In other words, with the power they received from the government, they were continuing their plunder of nature at full speed. I wrote about these issues in detail in my books “Golden Death,” “Golden Vortex,” and “The Çöpler Disaster.” 

I had come to MKTV this time for Fatih’s program to talk about nature, plunder, and colonial mining again. I had previously been a guest on Mustafa Sağlamer’s programs at Mavi Karadeniz TV several times. My friendship with Mustafa Sağlamer, one of the well-known names in television journalism, also goes back a long way. However, when Mavi Karadeniz TV changed hands, Sağlamer left. Honestly, I didn’t know who bought it or why it changed hands. I asked Fatih about this too. He explained it as a group of people who wanted to do journalism. They had brought Hakan Aygün to head it. I never worked with Hakan Aygün.

Of course, seeing the Nurol Holding sign in the environment I arrived in bothered me. I shared this with Fatih as well. I asked very clearly whether MKTV had any connection with Nurol. He said it did not. He said it was a coincidence that the two offices were side by side. However, another point that caught my attention was that the Nurol Holding Office and MKTV shared a common area for tea rooms and restrooms. In fact, more importantly, MKTV, which today supports Kılıçdaroğlu and the 'Butlan' (Nullity) Team, was located in the Karum Business Center, which was built by Nurol Holding, is owned by Nurol Holding, and has the most expensive office rents in Ankara.

Anyway, while preparing for the broadcast, I was also examining the environment I was in. Of course, the Mavi Karadeniz Ankara Bureau was broadcasting with limited resources. In a small room, there was a small broadcast desk with a director, two cameras, and two chairs where we sat side by side. 

A person in a room separated by a glass partition right next to us immediately caught my attention. This person was someone who had also served as a member of parliament for a period. I remembered his face very well, but I couldn’t recall his name. I asked, and they told me it was Müslim Sarı. During his time as a member of parliament, he was a cold, uncommunicative person who kept his distance from journalists. I don’t remember us doing a single interview with Müslim Sarı during his 24th term (between 2011-2015) as a member of parliament. I was working as a Kanal D Parliamentary Reporter at that time. Even though he saw that I had arrived and that we were preparing for the broadcast, he didn’t even bother to come out and say “welcome.” 

Anyway, that’s not the point... 

So, what was Müslim Sarı doing in the middle of Mavi Karadeniz’s Ankara Bureau? I asked Fatih that day, and he said that the area where the channel was located belonged to a foundation and that Müslim Sarı was also on the board of the foundation. On April 10, 2026, when I did the first program with Fatih, I honestly didn’t know Müslim Sarı’s political stance. I only participated in two programs on Mavi Karadeniz in total. The last one was on May 21, 2026, again at Fatih’s request, before the Eid al-Adha holiday. It was another program where we discussed wild mining and environmental-nature issues. At that time, I had question marks in my mind about the relationship between MKTV and Müslim Sarı and where MKTV stood. However, all these questions were answered with the police raid on the CHP on May 24 and the subsequent takeover of the party by the Kılıçdaroğlu 'Butlan' Team. Müslim Sarı had become a member of the Central Executive Board (MYK) in the 'Butlan' Administration and was elected Party Spokesperson. 

So why am I writing this? 

Actually, there is something deeper that I want to tell and that I learned a short time ago... 

About 1.5 years ago, in the winter months of 2025, when there were intense attacks on Ekrem İmamoğlu, I learned that a team including Müslim Sarı had made some contacts in Ankara. Müslim Sarı, who acts together with the 'Butlan' members who today seized the CHP Headquarters by police force, held some private meetings in Ankara within this framework. During these meetings, Sarı stated that they needed to prepare for a brand-new structure after Ekrem İmamoğlu, Özgür Özel, and Kılıçdaroğlu, and that they wanted to establish a cadre that would save the CHP from its current situation. I learned that Müslim Sarı, who said they were trying to build a cadre ranging from economists to public administrators, also asked some journalists for support regarding the communication and media relations of this cadre. While these meetings were taking place, the government had gradually increased the pressure on Ekrem İmamoğlu, but there was no 'Butlan' Raid or anything like that yet. But today’s 'Butlan' Team was preparing behind the scenes. They were trying to build a new cadre, creating a media infrastructure to make their voices heard, and today, they have burned their bridges to the point of saying, “Our A Haber is also Halktv.” 

Yes, Müslim Sarı being brought to the CHP Spokesperson position and MKTV continuing its broadcasting life in the Nurol Holding building might all be coincidences, but looking at the 'Butlan' Team’s love for A Haber and TGRT, it is understood that the MKTV support is not enough for them. 

İbrahim Gündüz