CHP leader Özgür Özel's challenge to ex officio investigation: 'Start with me...'

CHP Chairman Özgür Özel reacted in very harsh language to the threat of an ex officio investigation by the Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor's Office, regarding allegations of pressure on certain individuals who were made "confessors" in the corruption investigation conducted into the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality (IMM).

START THE INVESTIGATION WITH ME

Özel said, "Start the investigation with me. I am saying these words on behalf of hundreds, thousands, and millions. Do not hold back. But know that at the end of this investigation, it will be clear who really needs to be put on trial."

(What would you like to say regarding the statement that an ex officio investigation will be launched against those who make statements claiming that pressure is being applied, especially regarding the confessors?)

Let it start with me immediately. I have personally heard the Chief Public Prosecutor's Office and chief prosecutors calling people in, sometimes without their lawyers, sometimes while they have lawyers, and even taking a person from Kandıra Prison to Çağlayan, and in any given room, a chief prosecutor and two prosecutors telling a person who says, "Where is my lawyer?" that "There is no need for a lawyer, we called you for a chat," and then trying to motivate them to become a slanderer, a confessor, and to commit slander, and then applying pressure; I have personally heard that women are threatened with their children, being told, "If you talk like this, you won't see your child for 15 years. If you give a statement as I want, you will go home from here."

Let them start the ex officio investigation with me. I am saying this on behalf of the tens, hundreds, thousands, and millions who would say this, my brother. I am saying it, do not hold back at all, start the investigation. But know this, my brother: at the end of this investigation, when the day comes, when the people you pressured, the people you forced to become confessors, the people you forced to commit slander say this about you, you will be the subject of this investigation and you will be the one being punished.

This is both a legal crime, a moral responsibility, and one of the greatest sins in the sight of God. I will remind you of this in the courtyard of the mosque following Friday prayers.

In the sight of God, forcing someone to slander another and threatening them with their own freedom is the greatest of sins. Sir, also, Ekrem Bey's post; Ekrem Bey's post is a very brave, very heroic post.

They are threatening people, women with their children, fathers with their offspring. Even now, they have detained the child of a valued friend of ours, whom they have brought in and taken out repeatedly to be a confessor, and they are threatening the father through his child throughout the detention period.

Do we not know, do we not understand? That is why Ekrem Bey says, friends, give the slanders they want for the sake of your children. I will carry this burden on my back. Because what will happen if slander is committed, friends? Now they say there is a ban, they leak what suits them to their partisan press. They have them discussed on television in the evenings, they stop as they see fit. Is there no end to this? Eventually, an indictment will be issued. When the indictment is issued against those who play with lies and slander, saying it was like this or like that, we will play with them like a cat plays with a mouse. Because there is no evidence, because these are slanders. This statement must have a concrete equivalent. We will see that.

If there is anyone who will remain free by slandering Mayor Ekrem, Ekrem Mayor says, "Do not trade my freedom for the peace and future of your children. I am willing to stay inside." Sign the things they say are lies, even though you know they are lies, and get out. He says, "I am innocent anyway, I am right, I will prove my innocence."

It is a brave stance. He had shown the courtesy to share that thought with me. I said the choice is yours, you decide how to express such a thing. But I had known for a few days, for a while, that he was intending to make such a statement. I had known for a few days, and after what they did yesterday, the thing that hurt the most was dealing with the family. They took the child of his close friend inside, and they are threatening his friend through his freedom. And he says, I will carry this burden on my back.