Conflict of Interests in the Media Undermine Journalists’ Independence

In a statement to the press, the Turkish journalist association TGC have described the current state of the press as being unstable.

"It has been observed that the media is involved in numerous conflicts of interest and subject to the influence of certain power groups. This is reflected in the policies of the media. In these circumstances it is not possible to talk of journalistic independence."

The press statement follows the debate that has taken place over the past few weeks on the decision by the leadership of the daily newspaper Sabah, not to publish a commentary by the columnist Cengiz Candar where he criticises the general staff. Candar is one of the journalists who has come under fire as a supporter of the PKK. The background concerns a memo from the General Staff in which it emerges that complaints against Candar resulted from a dirty tricks campaign by the general staff. The member of parliament of the "Virtue Party" (successor of the "Welfare Party"), Nazli Ilicak, discovered the dirty tricks campaign and printed the memo in the newspaper Yeni Safak. The newspaper "Radical" then printed the complete article by Candar. The daily paper Cumhuriyet has referred to Sabah disdainfully as a "semi-official newspaper".

In a report from the press council in October it was confirmed that a number of journalist have been suspected of taking financial bribes. The ex-Sabha columnist Rauf Tamer was accused of taking 1 million dollars in bribes from the former owner of the Egebank, Yahya Murat Demirel (also nephew of the former president of state Süleyman Demirel). 

The Turkish human rights organisation IHD and its former chairman Akin Birdal have also been victims of the general staff’s dirty tricks campaign. Birdal, together with the current IHD chairman Hüsnü Öndül, has indicated that he intends to take legal proceedings against Cevik Bir a former member of the general staff. Öndül said that a dirty tricks campaign against the IHD and Birdal was carried out through the media in April 1998, a result of which was the attempt on his life.

(Source: Turkish Daily News, 08.11.00/14.11.00)