Veteran journalist who ‘knew everything’ dies

ISTANBUL

Veteran Turkish journalist Tufan Türenç, who was called “the man who knows everything” by his colleagues in the daily Hürriyet, where he worked for over three decades, has died at the age of 77 in the capital Ankara on April 23.

He was being treated in a hospital for some time for a heart condition.

“Turkish media has lost a master,” the Media Council announced in a statement on April 24.

Born in 1945 in the northwestern province of Bursa’s Yenişehir district, he graduated from Saint Benoit Highschool in Istanbul. His love of journalism changed his university life when he dropped out from studying pharmacy and joined the journalism academy after his first year instead.

His first workplace was daily Milliyet, where he worked as a crime reporter for five years. He then became the managing editor of that same daily. In 1986, he started working at the Güneş daily, but two years later, he got the job offer of his life from daily Hürriyet.

The year was 1988 when he first entered daily Hürriyet and became a columnist by 1992.

Working also as a managing editor in the daily for three decades, Türenç retired from his position in 2017.

“The most important thing about him was that he was a man who knew everything,” journalist Yalçın Bayer said about him in an introduction column penned in 2002.

“He was a philanthropist, who tried to handle the problems of people around him and find solutions too,” said journalist Arif Dizdaroğlu, who knew him for nearly 35 years.

“Turkey lost a prominent highbrow and an author,” Dizdaroğlu added.

His colleagues at Hürriyet praised him for being the “silent force of the daily.”

“He always had a different point of view to the news. We learnt so much from him,” noted Emre Oral, deputy chief in editor of Hürriyet.

“A great loss to the Turkish media,” Hürriyet columnist Sedat Ergin expressed.

One of his most impressive qualities was that he “collected all his experiences from journalism in books,” according to veteran journalist Doğan Hızlan. “As an editor and a manager, he had many experiences. He penned all those true stories.”

Türenç will be laid to rest in Istanbul on April 25.