Will Özgür Özel be made the presidential candidate?

For some time now, the university diploma of Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu has been a subject of debate. The discussion over whether his “lateral transfer was ethical or not” has intensified further following İmamoğlu’s consistent gains in polls conducted by independent research firms.

Journalists close to the government are now writing without hesitation that İmamoğlu’s diploma will be revoked. Hürriyet newspaper columnist Abdülkadir Selvi even went a step further, announcing that the diploma would be revoked by the faculty within a few days. If such a development were to occur, it is unclear what would happen legally, but the CHP’s presidential candidate would be decided!

If his university diploma is deemed invalid, İmamoğlu cannot run for the presidency. It is evident that the second-in-line candidate, Mansur Yavaş, is disgruntled, having not even participated in the voting process within the CHP. It is also known that there are those within the party who hold negative views toward Mansur Yavaş.

So, in this scenario, who will be the CHP’s candidate? Özgür Özel, who says, “I will never be a candidate”? Or a completely different candidate?

This scenario whets the appetite of the AKP. Would Özel have a chance against President Erdoğan, or would we see another “The man won” case?

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SO MUCH FOR THE FREEDOM TO RECEIVE NEWS!

The day before yesterday, the news that Gazete Duvar, which has been in publication since 2016, would be shutting down hit the agenda like a bombshell. However, industry workers were not very surprised by this situation. The reason for the newspaper’s closure was announced as economic difficulties and Google’s recent algorithm change.

This is precisely why industry workers were not surprised. If things continue this way, many more publications could close.

Undoubtedly, the biggest source of revenue for independent publications outside of mainstream media in Turkey was the traffic they generated.

Google’s artificial intelligence algorithm, which affects site traffic all over the world, is a blow dealt especially to independent newspapers experiencing economic difficulties.

This change by the search engine also causes a loss of Press Advertisement Agency (BİK) revenues. This is because there is a requirement of 250 thousand unique daily visitors to earn income from BİK advertisements.

With this move, Google is sending independent newspapers to the guillotine, not just in Turkey but globally. What was one of our fundamental rights? Wasn’t it the freedom to receive news? The bottom line is that the imperialist world can silence anyone if it wants to. No one cares about your freedoms or your rights.

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WE HAVE BECOME A SAVAGE SOCIETY

Every day, we see increasingly savage news stories in newspaper headlines. Murder, rape, extortion, fraud. Things have reached such a point that no matter how great the scale of the savagery, recklessness, fraud, or theft, we have started not to be surprised.

Vandalism is rampant everywhere, regardless of whether it is a big city, a town, or a village. In the Akkise village of Çorum’s Kargı district, an 80-year-old woman is killed with 8 stab wounds and her house is set on fire.

In the Atakum district of Samsun, a pervert who asks a woman walking on the street, “If you are wearing a skirt, you are that type, what is your price?” beats the young woman to death when she reacts. He breaks her cheekbones.

In the heart of Istanbul, a businessperson is first defrauded, then beaten by 12 people, and their assets are seized through threats.

Before 24 hours pass, all these events are forgotten because new ones occur within those 24 hours. We are going through a period where there is no security of life or property. Anything can happen to us at any moment. Moreover, people no longer have the fear of going to prison. There is no room in the prisons anyway.

DEM Party MP Ömer Faruk Gergerlioğlu claimed that 400 thousand people are being held in prisons with a capacity of 300 thousand.

The Ministry of Justice is also planning to build 11 new prisons by 2027 due to the insufficiency of prisons. Social decay has reached such a dimension that almost everyone now has a criminal record.