He would run the country perfectly only if there were no media

Orhan Bursalı

The government has lowered the international report card of Turkey’s media to precisely zero.   

The attack incident on journalist Ahmet Hakan has been the peak they reached after steadily increasing the dosage. Who knows, maybe just as the slave to the leader disguised as a deputy said, they would have broken his bones until he went into a coma. Hakan took refuge in an apartment building and was saved with only a few broken bones. 

The ever-powerful and his men want to make the media “safe.” They have trimmed so many of the writers of the Doğan Media but that’s how good it gets. The daily Hürriyet should be neutralized, with or without pooling. This is the issue. 

The organized attack went on for years; first, it peaked with the Finance Ministry’s dispossession operations. In the past month, it climbed with hitmen from various layers but this time, it peaked with physical attacks. It exploded with the Hakan incident. 

Here is where Turkey stands according to the Reporters Without Borders. Turkey was in 99th place out of 134 countries in 2002. It was the 98th country out of 161 in 2005. Turkey was the 100th in 2006, out of 161 countries, and 101st out of 164 countries in 2007. When the year was 2008, Turkey ranked 102 out of 168 and in 2009, 122 out of 170. In 2010, our country was 138th among 173 countries and in 2012, 2013 and 2014, it went up to the 154th place among 170 to 180 countries. In 2015, Turkey is 149th among 180 countries. 

According to another international press freedom indicator, let us take a look at the Freedom House’s press freedom report. For many years, Turkey was among the partly-free countries in this index. But from year to year, it cruised toward the lower ranks of the partly-free countries and in 2013, it fell into the class of not-free countries.  

In 2010, with 54 bad points, in 2011, with 55 bad points, and in 2012, with 56 bad points, our country was among the partly-free ones. In 2013, however, the AKP government succeeded in becoming one of the not-free countries by exceeding 60 bad points. In 2014, it continued in its success of getting worse and reached 65 bad points. Kudos! 

The ever-powerful never gave up his policies of blowing up mainstream media that would be free, able to question him, criticize him, make objective stories and give equal space to the opposition. He destroyed them all together. There has not been such a pitiless destruction process ever in the history of press in Turkey.  

Well, what about the top-selling daily Sözcü? And the daily Cumhuriyet? They were the mouthpiece of the opposition anyway and their whole business was writing lies. Would it ever write the truth? He would explain the situation to his own voters as such. First, the one at the center be dealt with, then later they would find ways to “get” the others. The policies of pressuring the opposition media with ads and with court cases were already in place.  

The priority was to finish up Hürriyet first. But they are aware this was an impossible mission; for this reason, they took it to levels of physical destruction with rage and hate.

Solidarity with Hürriyet is a part of the struggle for freedom. 

You? Well, you will be left alone with the burden of what you have done and you will have to leave the scene…

obursali@cumhuriyet.com.tr