Turkish civil servant exam cancelled after allegations of fraud

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has removed from office the head of the Measuring, Selection and Placement Center (ÖSYM) in the face of allegations that some questions of the Public Personnel Selection Exam (KPSS) were leaked. The new ÖSYM chief on Aug. 4 addressed the public, saying that the KPSS exam was cancelled and a new exam would take place in the upcoming days.

Wednesday August 03 2022 03:56 pm

About 1.5 million people took the public sector placement exam overseen by ÖSYM over the weekend.

Duvar English

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has sacked Prof. Dr. Halis Aygün, the head of the Measuring, Selection and Placement Center (ÖSYM), with a midnight decree after allegations of stolen questions in the 2022 Public Personnel Selection Examination (KPSS) surfaced.

Erdoğan's official Twitter account said on Aug. 2 that the State Supervisory Council (DDK) had been authorized to look into the issue.

Devlet Denetleme Kurulumuzun 2022 KPSS ile ilgili yapacağı inceleme sonucunda elde edilen veriler titizlikle değerlendirilecek, gerekli adımlar ivedilikle atılacaktır.

Tek bir evladımızın dahi mağdur olmasına asla müsaade etmeyiz. https://t.co/zZDLbzcJHY
— Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (@RTErdogan) August 2, 2022

DDK head Yunus Arıncı on Aug. 3 said that the institution's inspectors would pay a visit to ÖSYM later on in the day. “The report [of the DDK] will be submitted to President Erdoğan. It seems that there is a problematic situation,” Arıncı was quoted as saying by broadcaster NTV.

About 1.5 million people took the public sector placement exam overseen by ÖSYM over the weekend. Afterwards, it was reported that several of the questions were the same as the ones found in preparation exams and videos of Yediiklim Publishing House.

Several exam takers demanded the exam's cancellation, while opposition politicians urged a swift probe into the incident. ÖSYM, on the other hand, refuted the allegations of a fraud, saying in a statement: “Claims that some of the questions were the same as the ones found in a publishing house's preparation exam are baseless.”

Main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) lawmaker Yıldırım Kaya said the number of such questions amounted to 20 in the exam and that the questions must have been leaked. “You [government] had previously said that 'FETÖ [Gülen network] members stole the questions and leaked it to its own members' [in previous scandals]. What about this time? To whom have the questions been given? To which of the partisans have the questions been given?” Kaya said, recalling that investigations into previous KPSS frauds had found Gülen network members guilty.

On Aug. 4, Erdoğan appointed Prof. Bayram Ali Ersoy as the new ÖSYM chief. Soon after he assumed the post, Ersoy addressed the public, saying that the KPSS exam was cancelled and a new exam would take place in the upcoming days.