15 July and Akıncı Base: Gülen congregants’ interest in looking for estate grounds in Kazan

When an assistant professor (Dr. Adil Öksüz) at the Sakarya University Faculty of Theology gets caught by gendarmerie around Akıncı Base in an open field on July 15, 2016, the night of the coup attempt, and says he was looking for an estate ground, how convincing would that sound?

When someone (Kemal Batmaz) who had been working as a senior executive at the Gülen organization’s companies for many years and later went into the real estate business gets caught by gendarmerie at Ankara’s Kazan district in a village near the base in the early morning of the coup attempt and says one of his friends is looking for real estate around there and he is there to help him, how convincing would that sound? 

When someone (Harun Biniş) who had been working at the Information and Communication Technologies Authority at one point, later quitting his job and currently in an unemployed state – in his words – an electronics engineer, and when he gets caught in the same village and says he came to look for an estate ground with his friend, can that be found convincing? Let’s confine ourselves to reminding that this person was put on trial as suspect in a telephone tapping case. 

When someone (Nurettin Oruç) who is a graduate in psychological counseling and lectures in classrooms of the Gülen congregation, later transfers to the position of school counselor, saying he has been working at a movie company for two years by now and when he gets caught by gendarmerie on the morning of July 16, 2016 around the Akıncı Base, says he went there to film a documentary about livestock raising, could this be accepted as a convincing statement?

A businessman (Hakan Çiçek) doing trade, who owns three different companies and owns schools gets caught by gendarmerie on the  morning of July 16, 2016 around Akıncı Base and says that he was invited for a social activity by a colonel to the base, can you see a convincing contradiction here?

The number one suspect accused of the July 15 coup attempt’s central operations base at the Fourth Jet Base Command is Fetullah Gülen. After the first suspect, the other five suspects at the “civilian rulers” group on the morning of July 16, 2016 get caught around the base, the defense’s main supports made at the prosecution can be summarized by these quotations:

“My uncle Mehmet Öksüz told me that in Kazan, there were valuable estate grounds that would bring good money in the future. On July 15, I performed the Friday prayer in Sakarya, in the evening I stayed at my uncle’s house in Keçiören, Ankara. I took a taxi at Keçiören on the morning of July 16. I came by a taxi, looked for a field in the area. I made a deal for 150 TL with the taxi driver. I knew the area, I let the driver go,” stated Adil Öksöz, for example.

“Harun Biniş who I have met before had called me. I told him that I was also going to my children at Nevşehir. He told me in return, ‘If you go through Ankara, I have a fair amount of money. Let’s look for an estate ground for me, help me.’ We met at Çayyolu. We got on a taxi. There was no house near the area we were caught in by the gendarmerie, but we were looking at the opposite houses far away. We were thinking to go to the area where these houses stood,” explained Kemal Batmaz, regarding the reason why he was there.

“Although I myself am unemployed, I thought to do business in the form of a real estate deal. Kemal Batmaz and I agreed with finding an estate ground around Kazan. We met at Ümitköy on the morning of July 16 at 08:00 a.m., by stepping in a taxi, we went to Kazan. We entered a village we did not know in Kazan. On the road, gendarmerie brought us to the police station,” explained his friend who was caught with him.

“On July 16, 2016 at 08:00 a.m., he arrived at a village in the Akıncılar quarter of Kazan district by means of hitch hiking from Ankara and changing three vehicles, aiming to pre-interview and sign a contract for a documentary on livestock raising. He departed to go to villages of Kazan, not knowing which way to go in the beginning.  He stepped out in a village close to Akıncı quarters with the advice of the driver and was caught by gendarmerie,” read Nurettin Oruç’s statement on the prosecution’s conveyance.

 “On Friday, Colonel Ahmet Özçetin, one of our student’s parents, invited me to a social activity in the evening at around 08:30 p.m. to the Akıncı Base. I went to the Akıncı base. Colonel Ahmet Özçetin was also present. The military activity started a couple minutes after I arrived there. I did not leave when it started. I stayed there until the morning. At 08:00 a.m. in the morning, upon seeing the fugitives escaping by jumping over the fences, I also jumped over the fences on the concrete wall and started walking to the village. It didn’t look normal for the colonel to invite me there to the base that night, but this is the truth,” read Hakan Çiçek’s defense, on the other hand.

Yes, if you take these statements seriously, only real estate issues, documentary work and social activity is relevant. But the security cameras of Akıncı base and their exposition present at the base that night do not say the same thing. Let’s look at that side of the issue tomorrow.