Report claims government categorized schools linked to Hizmet

Snapshot of Taraf daily's front page on Sunday. (Photo: Today's Zaman)
Snapshot of Taraf daily's front page on Sunday. (Photo: Today's Zaman)


Date posted: December 1, 2013

The Turkish government classified, categorized and monitored a number of educational institutions in some way linked to Hizmet, a faith-based movement inspired by Turkish Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen, until 2010, a Turkish daily reported on Sunday.

The reporting is part of a series of leaks the daily published in the past few days unveiling a National Security Council (MGK) document that asks the government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to finish off Gülen and curb his activities, both in Turkey and abroad. The document, endorsed in 2004, was signed by a number of officials, including Erdoğan, then-Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül and then-Justice Minister Cemil Çiçek.

Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Bülent Arınç has dismissed the document, saying that the government has never implemented the policy prescriptions it includes. Other ministers, as well as Erdoğan’s top aide, Yalçın Akdoğan, made assurances that the government has never taken any action in line with the document.

On Sunday, the Taraf daily published five documents which list private educational institutions, including both regular schools and prep schools, that are “suspected of having links to reactionary activities.” The report was a response to a government narrative that the 2004 MGK decision was “null and void” for the government and that the authorities never implemented its recommendations.

The documents show that inspectors linked to the Prime Ministry monitored and categorized the schools every month up until 2010, when the government abolished the Prime Ministry Implementation Monitoring and Coordination Council (BUTKK), a body that was set up to monitor “reactionary activities” after Feb. 28, 1997 post-modern coup.

The Feb. 28 military intervention, called a “postmodern coup” because it was carried out without the use of arms, occurred when military generals confronted a civilian coalition government at an MGK meeting on Feb. 28, 1997, which resulted in the forced resignation of the government led by a now-defunct religious-minded party. The period following Feb. 28 was characterized by mass human rights violations in Turkey, and conservative groups were put under immense pressure.

The 2004 MGK document demands the government, in coordination with Interior Ministry, Foreign Ministry, Education Ministry and National Intelligence Organization (MİT), monitor and curb Gülen’s activities. The document required the government to closely monitor private schools, student houses, foundations, associations, dorms, domestic and foreign activities and Abant conferences that are linked to the Hizmet movement.

The MGK is the top state body created by the 1960 military coup. It was seen as a shadow government while the military was in power. Furthermore, it ruled the country directly from 1980 to 1983 before transferring power to the civilian government.

The document has sparked outrage in Turkey, with opposition parties criticizing the government for lying to the Turkish people while intellectuals have slammed the government for endorsing an MGK decision that is seen as a plot against the country’s citizens.

Erdoğan has yet to make any remark on the document, which also bears his name. Many pro-government columnists claimed that the government had to sign the document in order to, as a matter of fact, protect the Hizmet movement from the wrath of the military, which had a strong role in politics.

On Friday, Taraf published a document, signed only two months after the MGK decision, in which then-Prime Ministry Undersecretary Ömer Dinçer orders that steps should be taken to monitor “reactionary activities” with regular reporting back to the Prime Ministry. Taraf provided the document as evidence that the national security document was in fact implemented during the Erdoğan’s government.

Dinçer, who was appointed as education minister in 2011, told reporters on Saturday that the 2004 MGK decision was not implemented and that the document Taraf published is a separate process, a remnant of the previous government, which was determined to fight against “reactionary religious activities.”

He said the MGK decision in 2004 was only a recommendation to the government and the government didn’t bring it to the agenda of the Cabinet and shelved the policy recommendation by the MGK. He noted that the document Taraf published, which bears Dinçer’s signature, is an extension of activities endorsed after the Feb. 28, 1997 coup.

Dinçer said the government headed by Prime Minister Mesut Yılmaz after Feb. 28, 1997, drafted an action plan to monitor and fight against religious groups, including Gülen and the Hizmet movement. To coordinate and implement this action plan, the government established BUTKK at the Prime Ministry.

Dinçer accused the Taraf daily of not being aware of bureaucratic processes, formal written correspondence or the Turkish legal system. This, Dinçer claimed, led Taraf to interpret his letters as part of the MGK decision endorsed in 2004 and confused these two “completely different and separate things.”

He said the written correspondence about the action plan to “fight against reactionaryism” cannot be presented as an action plan against the Hizmet movement.

Deputy Prime Minister Bekir Bozdağ voiced similar remarks and said Dinçer’s correspondence is different from the 2004 MGK decision. He said the correspondence is part of routine work of the BUTKK, which “we abolished in 2010.”

In a response to Dinçer and Bozdağ, Taraf published five detailed documents that recorded the inspectors monitoring schools and prep schools linked to the Hizmet movement. The reason for the monitoring was given as “links between the educational institutions and reactionary groups.”

Justice and Development Party (AK Party) Deputy Chairman Mehmet Ali Şahin, who was a MGK member in 2004 but couldn’t attend the meeting because of a trip to Athens, said the decision was in fact signed to protect the Hizmet movement. He said he would also have signed the document, pointing to the military tutelage system that was dominant in Turkey.

In a first public comment on the issue, Gülen described himself as “speechless” and expressed his disappointment about the MGK decision in 2004.

Gülen stated that if the government had not undertaken steps to close the prep schools, a move strongly decried by the Hizmet movement, he would have given the government the “benefit of the doubt” and considered the document something “circumstantial.”

“What was required for the benefit of the doubt was this: We don’t know the conditions of the time. We weren’t acquainted with the matter so that we could know its background and assess it with its philosophy. This is how I would have looked at it if it had not had a continuation,” Gülen said in statements released on his website, herkul.org, on Sunday.

“But after statements confirmed the document, not only did I feel shattered, I am left speechless,” he added.

Meanwhile, Felicity Party Chairman Mustafa Kamalak said on Saturday that it doesn’t make sense to discuss the authenticity of the document and described the document as “unacceptable.”

He said the government’s plan to shut down the prep schools is reminiscent of the Feb. 28 coup process and is the opposite of the “national will.”

Source: Today's Zaman , December 1, 2013


Related News

Conflict between Gülen Movement and Turkey’s ruling AKP reflected in business world

TÜSİAD, just like the [Hizmet] community’s TUSKON, has voiced the concern of possible fouls likely to be committed against the judiciary. As a matter of fact, these concerns have proved right for now with the executive seizing the judiciary.

Samanyolu permission to shoot Ramadan program in mosque

Requests submitted by the Samanyolu Group seeking permission for two of its stations to shoot programs in the gardens of two mosques in the Üsküdar district of Istanbul during the holy month of Ramadan have been turned down by the İstanbul Mufti’s Office.

The businessman who sits on his cell phone to avoid wiretapping

A businessman summarized it like this: “In the past, it was very important in the business community to have a meeting with Fethullah Gülen. Those going to the United States would try to get an appointment; yet today, different meanings are being attributed to these meetings. Those who in the past made sure to have these meetings publicly are now praying they do not come to the surface.”

U.S., Turkey at impasse over extraditing Muslim cleric living in Poconos

Turkey says the United States is legally bound by a treaty to immediately hand over Fethullah Gulen, the Poconos-based Muslim cleric it accuses of plotting to overthrow Turkey’s government.

Turkish aid organization becomes direct target of AK Party

Kimse Yok Mu, a UN-affiliated aid organization based in Turkey and the only Turkish organization that has a large outreach presence in 113 countries, continues to be a direct target of the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government due to the latter’s hatred of the faith-based Hizmet movement, which inspired the work of the organization.

Turkish PM admits did not know identity of putschists when he blamed Gülen movement

A year after a failed coup on July 15, 2016, Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım said he did not know who had attempted to carry out the coup when they blamed the Gülen movement, in an interview published in Hürriyet.

Latest News

Fethullah Gulen – man of education, peace and dialogue – passes away

Fethullah Gülen’s Condolence Message for South African Human Rights Defender Archbishop Desmond Tutu

Hizmet Movement Declares Core Values with Unified Voice

Ankara systematically tortures supporters of Gülen movement, Kurds, Turkey Tribunal rapporteurs say

Erdogan possessed by Pharaoh, Herod, Hitler spirits?

Devious Use of International Organizations to Persecute Dissidents Abroad: The Erdogan Case

A “Controlled Coup”: Erdogan’s Contribution to the Autocrats’ Playbook

Why is Turkey’s Erdogan persecuting the Gulen movement?

Purge-victim man sent back to prison over Gulen links despite stage 4 cancer diagnosis

In Case You Missed It

Gülen denies attempting to axe peace process

CCBT Teaches Turkish in Public School in Rio de Janeiro

Kimse Yok Mu reach out its helping held by distributing meat in Mongolia

Ex-CIA Director: Mike Flynn and Turkish Officials Discussed Removal of Gulen from U.S. without Going through Legal Process

Gülen urges Hizmet members to defend prep schools in civilized way

Erdogan regime keeps defamation of the Gülen mov’t, calls it crusader organization

Turkey’s Erdogan and onslaughts against opposition

Copyright 2025 Hizmet News