Breaking News: İmamoğlu takes diploma ruling to appellate court

Ekrem İmamoğlu, the CHP's presidential candidate and Mayor of Istanbul, who has been detained in Silivri Prison since March 23, has taken the Istanbul 5th Administrative Court's rejection of his lawsuit against the cancellation of his diploma to the appellate court.

Appealing through his lawyers, İmamoğlu requested a stay of execution and for the case to be accepted.

The appeal petition stated, "It is established that no obligation was foreseen, it is indisputable that no opinion and/or approval from the Council of Higher Education (YÖK) was sought in the legislation, and considering that the questions asked by the relevant universities for the purpose of consulting YÖK only when doubts arose regarding a portion of the hundreds of lateral transfer applications made during that period, and the answers given specifically to these questions, do not constitute a general regulatory act and/or were not announced to the public, it is absurd to expect our client, who had completed the first year of university and made his application by meeting the conditions foreseen for lateral transfer, to be aware of the correspondence between various universities and YÖK."

The appeal highlighted the following points:

"As clearly understood from the Student Status Certificate dated 20.2.1991, which was issued by the university itself after our client was accepted as a student, there is no doubt that the university from which our client transferred was always known by the Defendant Administration..."

Even while the Defendant Administration's counsel (Istanbul University) explicitly admitted during the hearing that 'We are not talking about an action taken by the esteemed Plaintiff,' acknowledging that our client had no irregularities, the Istanbul 5th Administrative Court went beyond this defense and accepted that the student had an obligation to inform the administration about what was written in the student registry books belonging to the university—which the student never saw nor was required to see throughout their student life—is an acceptance that cannot be explained by the rules of reason and logic...

While the Council of State's 1987 Unification of Jurisprudence Board (İBK) decision did not accept that an administrative act could always be revoked even in cases of fraud or false declaration, the cancellation of our client's lateral transfer, graduation, and diploma 35 years later—despite him having no fraudulent behavior or false declarations, and having had his lateral transfer application accepted by meeting all announced conditions and proving them—and the Istanbul 5th Administrative Court's decision dated 23.1.2026 finding this process lawful, are inconsistent with the law and the binding Council of State İBK decision."

The conclusion section of the application included the following issues and requests:

"CAUSING IRREPARABLE HARM"

"The cancellation of our client's lateral transfer, graduation, and diploma—who earned the right to graduate first with a bachelor's degree and then a master's degree following a lateral transfer made in accordance with the law 35 years ago—causes irreparable harm to our client's legal status and standing, and the concrete circumstances of this case necessitate a stay of execution."

...Considering the necessity of initiating candidacy applications and procedures months in advance in the event that the possibility of an early presidential election is realized, our client's presidential candidacy will be obstructed by the action in question, which is the exact definition of irreparable harm. Furthermore, in this scenario, our client's right to be elected under Article 67 of the Constitution of the Republic of Turkey would be taken away and violated, and consequently, the citizens' right to vote would also be violated. These results are a clear indication that the irreparable harm caused by the action in question will arise not only for our client but also for the citizens."

...We request that the execution of the unfair and unlawful action in question and the unlawful decision rendered by the Istanbul 5th Administrative Court be stayed, and that the decision subject to appeal be overturned and our case be accepted...

"FOR A STAY OF EXECUTION AND THE OVERTURNING OF THE 5TH ADMINISTRATIVE COURT'S DECISION..."

For all the reasons explained above and other reasons to be considered ex officio by your esteemed court, we request that the appellate review be conducted with a hearing in accordance with this appeal application,

a) Primarily and urgently, for a STAY OF EXECUTION of the action in question and the decision of the Istanbul 5th Administrative Court dated January 23, 2026, which is clearly contrary to the law and causes harm that is difficult or impossible to compensate, to reject the case,

b) Regarding the action in question established concerning our client and other individuals whose lateral transfers, graduations, and diplomas were decided to be revoked and cancelled, we request that the Istanbul University Rectorate be required to SUBMIT TO THE CASE FILE in full whether any evaluation was requested from the Istanbul University Faculty of Law in the form of an opinion, report, information note, and/or similar study; and if requested, the assignment letters related to this, and the results of the evaluations made by the relevant professors of the Faculty of Law.

c) For our appeal application to be ACCEPTED,

d) For the decision of the Istanbul 5th Administrative Court dated January 23, 2026, to reject the case to be

OVERTURNED,

e) With the acceptance of our rightful case, for the cancellation of the

subject of the lawsuit, which is clearly unlawful to the point of being considered void..."

WHAT HAD HAPPENED?

İmamoğlu's diploma was cancelled by Istanbul University on March 18, 2025. İmamoğlu had taken this decision to the Council of State.

The lawsuit filed by İmamoğlu against the cancellation of his diploma was unanimously rejected by the Istanbul 5th Administrative Court last month.

The reasoned decision pointed to articles 2, 3, 5, 8, and 11 of the Regulation on Principles for Horizontal Transfers at the Associate and Undergraduate Level Between Higher Education Institutions (Official Gazette dated 21.10.1982 and numbered 17845), which was in effect at the time of the horizontal transfer in question, as well as legislation that came into force in subsequent years. The decision alleged that İmamoğlu did not act in good faith.

News Source: 12punto