Second arrest warrant issued for ousted CHP mayor already in prison

In the investigation in which CHP's Beşiktaş Mayor was arrested, an arrest order has been issued for Ahmet Özer, the former Mayor of Esenyurt, who has already been in prison for four months in another investigation that led to a trustee appointment to his office.

Tuesday January 21 2025 01:38 am

Furkan Karabay / Gazete Duvar

In the investigation conducted by the Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor's Office, which claimed that an alleged criminal organization participated tenders by bribing mayors, a second arrest order was issued for former Esenyurt Mayor Ahmet Özer, who has been already in prison for four months.

The former main opposition Republican People’s Party mayor was arrested four months ago on charges of “being a member of a terrorist organization” and replaced with a trustee.

In the current investigation, the CHP's Beşiktaş Municipality Mayor Rıza Akpolat was also arrested and removed from office.

Özer, who gave his statement to the court online from the prison, denied the allegations of "tampering with a tender."

He stated that he had never given written or verbal instructions to the companies participating in the tender, and that he was not familiar with Aziz İhsan Aktaş, who was claimed to be the leader of the alleged criminal organization, nor had he heard of his company before.

Referring to the tenders that were cited as the basis for the allegations, Özer raised the question, "If both tenders were tampered with, why were these contracts implemented and not canceled after the trustee appointed (to the municipality)?"

Özer added, "No payments were made for the tenders you have questioned during my term, not a single penny was paid."

The former main-opposition mayor’s lawyers stated that there was no expert report in the case file indicating the occurrence of the crime, and underscored that Can Aksoy, the trustee appointed in place of Özer, did not cancel the tenders in question but rather continued them.

The court decided to arrest Özer, citing the reason for his re-arrest as "the evidence not yet being collected."

What happened?

A Turkish court on Oct. 31 arrested Istanbul’s Esenyurt District Mayor Özer on charges of "membership in the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) armed terrorist organization."

After his arrested, he was replaced with a trustee by the government.

On Jan. 18, Turkish Interior Ministry suspended Beşiktaş Mayor Akpolat “as a temporary measure” from duty. Akpolat was also arrested as part of a criminal investigation that was launched against an alleged “profit-driven crime syndicate,” which is seen as the government’s new crackdown attempt on Istanbul’s popular mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu.