“If you’re looking for the octopus’s arms – Fatih, Bayrampaşa, Bahçelievler, and soon Esenler,” declared Özgür Özel, head of Turkey’s main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), in a fiery parliamentary group speech in Ankara on Tuesday, accusing President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s party of systemic municipal corruption.
Özel’s remarks were a pointed response to Erdoğan, who had previously dismissed allegations against the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) by likening them to an “octopus” attacking the state. But Özel flipped the metaphor, arguing the real “octopus” was rooted in the AKP itself — “a sprawling structure of corruption with many arms, protected by silence and impunity.”
Özel cited a series of reports by Turkey’s Court of Accounts and criminal complaints filed against AKP-led municipalities, including Fatih, Bayrampaşa, and Bahçelievler in Istanbul. He claimed these files documented serious irregularities ranging from illegal payments to municipal officials to the operation of unlicensed businesses on public land.
“In Fatih Municipality, deputy mayors were paid by multiple municipal companies — a clear legal violation. Advertising space was rented without any public tender, student dormitory land turned into a hotel, and nothing was done,” Özel said, holding up a July 2024 audit decision as evidence.
He added: “There is a hotel running on land meant for a student dormitory. It’s been operating illegally for nearly a decade. And the mayor has done nothing.”
In Bahçelievler, he claimed a cleaning services contract was deliberately split into two tenders to favour a specific company — Bilginay Cleaning — which also secured contracts in other cities. “The total cost ballooned from 565 million to 843 million lira. Why? Because they wanted to give more to their chosen company,” Özel charged.
The CHP leader also drew attention to what he called the “financial arm of the coup”, referencing Treasury and Finance Minister Mehmet Şimşek. “These reserves weren’t saved for 1.6 million unemployed or the pensioners living on 14,000 lira (approximately 360 USD) — they were saved for today, to keep this machine running,” Özel said.
He connected these financial manoeuvres to broader concerns about democracy and foreign influence, claiming that a 19 March judicial move to restrict Istanbul’s CHP mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu was akin to a political coup, and that the government had signed lucrative oil deals with American interests just days before.
“They accuse us with empty files while the real theft goes untouched,” he said. “They jailed our mayors based on lies. But the ones who stole public money walk free because they wear AKP badges.”
Özel said Erdoğan’s so-called “octopus” — used to discredit CHP — was in fact a reference to a network of corruption he himself sustained. “Let me show you Erdoğan’s real octopus: the ‘gang of five’, the Cyprus loot, the Red Crescent tent scandal, the 17–25 December shoeboxes full of money,” he said, listing long-standing scandals linked to the AKP.
Ending his speech, Özel announced that the CHP would launch a nationwide campaign. “This Thursday, we’re visiting workers’ unions. Then we meet employers, pensioners, tradespeople. We will walk street by street — not asking just one man, but asking everyone.”
The allegations come amid deepening economic woes in Turkey, with inflation, unemployment and a depreciating lira fuelling public discontent ahead of potential early elections.
