A week of overflowing e-mails. Along with a number of other journalists and prominent football officials, I have been put on a list for dissatisfied Turkish football fans to write to complain of corruption in their league. So each day this week my inbox had about six-hundred e-mails from various people all writing the same form letters to denounce the situation there.
To review: Since last July, Turkish police have arrested almost a hundred players, coaches, referees and club officials on suspicion of fixing dozens of games in their league. The most prominent of the people arrested was the head of Fenerbahçe club. Fenerbahçe is one of Turkey’s most popular teams roughly equivalent to Manchester United or the New York Yankees. Their senior executives are alleged by police to have engaged in widespread corrupt practices.
Two things have occurred in Turkey, both of which I find deeply depressing. One is that in advance of the match-fixing trials, members of Turkey’s establishment have bent over backwards to ensure that the punishments (if there are guilty verdicts) are as light as possible. Last week, the Turkish Football Federation announced that clubs caught fixing would only have points deducted from them and not mandatory relegation to lower divisions. Part of the claim is that the clubs should not be punished for the actions of the senior executives. This is such spurious logic that it is difficult not to laugh.
However, what does make me fall about laughing are the actions of a majority of the Turkish parliamentary deputies. Last winter, this gang of clowns voted a serious sounding anti-match-fixing law that had severe penalties for fraud. A few months later when presumably many of the teams and executives that they support were in jeopardy of being punished under this new bill, they quickly reversed themselves and overturned their new law. You can just imagine the conversation that they must have had, ‘Oh you mean someone may actually be punished by a law that we passed? Someone may go to jail in Turkey for corruption? We never meant for that to happen! We just wanted it on the books to impress the European Union. We never intended for our friends to risk going to prison.’
Please, it is a resounding slap in the face to the Turkish police and judicial prosecution. Either you trust your institutions to do their job or you do not. You change laws and procedures if there are human rights abuses or institutional malfeasance not because your favorite football team might be in jeopardy. There has to be one law for all which if people are guilty they suffer for it.
The second depressing thing is that so many fans would write so many letters in such well-organized campaigns that are so erroneous. Most of these fans do not write because they are concerned for the well-being of sports or the Turkish judicial system (there are a few Turkish authors and journalists who love such an outpouring of support for their rights). Rather most of the people write because they want to either punish or support one particular team. Here is the important lesson for all Turks to learn – if Fenerbahçe (or any other team) fixed matches in Turkey (or any other country) they should be punished. If they did not, they should be acquitted.
Here is the real danger. I remember when my colleagues and I were investigating corruption in figure skating in 2000. Our documentary was about the alleged alliances between French and Russian officials to promote their own skaters, something that came to prominence at the Salt Lake City Olympic Games. During the course of the research, I interviewed a very bright journalist at the magazine Patinage. He said in some ways corruption had become an accepted part of figure skating. That some judges may be corrupt was accepted by the fans as a form of the soap opera of the sport. They could enjoy booing the judges if the marks for their favorite skaters was not correct. They could enjoy dreaming up conspiracy theories (some of which proved to be true) about the sport. This is the menace in Turkey, that football becomes a fantastic, social entertainment but it ceases to be a sport.
Tags: Fenerbahce, match fixing, turkey
Now with latest decisions of PFDK (Professional Football Discipline Committee) match fixing is longer a crime in Turkey. Football clubs who actively participated in match fixing are free from any form of fine or penalty. Only few players and managers are given some really lame fines which restricts them from activity in football for few years.
It is a real shame that football is sacrificed in favor of money and interest. Political and economical concerns have blinded justice. “Lig TV” The TV channel who has the monopoly in broadcasting for football matches in Turkey seems to be behind the economical part of the conspiracy.
Fenerbahce with millions of fans is also a big political concern for Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the prime minister of Turkey. Apparently, he doesn’t want to lose a single vote, as he closed his eyes while justice is being raped.
I hope UEFA will take the proper actions and ban Turkey from European matches for several years.
Dear Mr. Hill
You have stated “Please, it is a resounding slap in the face to the Turkish police and judicial prosecution. Either you trust your institutions to do their job or you do not”, please keep in mind that there are over 100 journalists, over 500 college-high school students are in prison, accused of being a member of terrorist organization. Not to mention that ex “Chief of Staff” in prison accused of being a member of terrorist organization and infiltrated into Turkish Army.
About the match fixing case the prosecutor accused Fenerbahce president building a mafia organization, and obtain surveillance permit on that basis. However he never put any charges in indictment besides match fixing. The indictment is 400 pages of phone records, police never made any busts on scene, an example, according to police before the final game against Sivasspor, Fenerbahce officials brought 2,5 mill USD in a garment bag to pay Sivaspor officials. Police did not act on scene and make an arrest. Later in the court the defense attorneys demonstrated that 2,5 mio USD does not fit in the very same garmentbag.
Please try to obtain the english version of indictment and read it yourself, contact objective journalists (if you can find one) not the ones controlled by the “Gulen movement” or funded by the government.
Kind Regards
Kerim King
Turkey is a perfect example of match fixing cover up by a government. The man named Yildirim Demiroren was put in charge to cover up the match fixing scandal where the main actor is popular football team called Fenerbahce.
With new rules and regulations rewritten from scratch it is almost impossible to punish a team for match fixing. Only managers are punished under certain conditions, which means a football team can attempt match fixing without any form of major risks at all.
All these are all done to protect Fenerbahce and Lig tv. Ligtv is the company who makes huge profits from broadcasting football matches in Turkey. Ligtv pays huge amount of pay offs to all Turkish teams in Super League, so majority of teams don’t want a reduction in money flow as a result of punishment to a big team like Fenerbahce. This is the point where financial concerns are put above all rules and moral values. If Fenerbahce is dropped from super league majority of Ligtv subscribers will cancel their subcriptions which means a huge loss for ligtv. Figure it yourself.
The situation is so bad and corruption is so deep that you can write a book alone dedicated to match fixing issues in Turkey.
The biggest joke was the fact that the parliamentary deputies decided to amend the match fixing law that stipulated a 5-12 year jail sentence, to 1-3 years (which really isn’t much). My guess is that they thought would have lost a lot of votes from their constituents if they didn’t change it.
By the way, you’re writing about article 58 of the TFF disciplinary code. Its only been amended. Section 1 of the article still stipulates that clubs caught fixing matches are relegated, and the maximum punishment for individuals trying to fix matches is barred for life. The change is in the attempt to fix matches. Now a club that attempts to fix matches is penalized starting from -12 points, while individuals who attempt the act of fixing matches are banned for 1-3 years. So what they’ve done is a sliding scale. There is a difference between committing the actual act and the attempt to do so. I can cite the extreme case of murder in this situation. Attempted murder will usually get someone a life sentence, while the actual act will have the murderer put to death. There has to be some sort of difference between attempts to engage in the act and actually pulling it off.
I think you would be surprised at the amount of journalists in Turkey currently imprisoned. Turkey is ranked 148th in the Press Freedom Index and jails more journalists than both China and Iran. Over 100 journalists are in prison, and from what can be observed, are only in jail (without any hint of a trial date, as Mustafa Balbay will attest to; same goes for Ahmet Sik and Nedim Sener, although they have been released) because they wrote critical pieces against the current AK Party led government. As for trusting the police, who really trusts Turkish police anyway? The Gulen movement has infiltrated that fully.
Don’t get me wrong, if any team engaged in match fixing, they should be punished. My problem with this case is that there seems to be way too many holes and way too much “grey area” for it to be legitimate.
Good to see you’ve seen the e-mail and tweet campaigns from Turkey to UEFA and FIFA for what they really are. Its a pathetic display of blind support for their own supported team and wish that the rivals get screwed, rather than legitimate concern for the well being of the league. The ulterior motives of those campaigns are obvious even to the most idiotic of people.
While there are campaigns from Turks to get UEFA to “ban” the country from their competitions, they can’t do it due to inaction, or little action, in response to it. UEFA can, via article 7 of their statutes, ban a country due to government interference in football affairs (and that’s a FIFA directive, although any idiot knows how “transparent” they are). I do think that there is some government interference in football affairs in Turkey. But for people in Turkey to think that UEFA can ban a country simply due to little action over match fixing, without actually reading the statues, shows the collective intelligence of the Turkish public. Perhaps satirical writer Aziz Nesin said it best when he said that 60% of the Turkish population are stupid (although I’m willing to bet its higher than that). It also doesn’t help when Turks seem to think they know everything and fabricating conspiracy theories is a national pastime.
To me, it seems as though soccer, and professional sports in general, are becoming more and more corrupt. The leagues would influence results in such a way that they maximize profit and water cooler talk. Almost as if one is watching sports in the style of World Wrestling Entertainment (and yes I admit to watching that), where results are manipulated. The only difference is, WWE has admitted to being fixed and being “sports entertainment”. I don’t know if you’ve seen http://thefixisin.net by Brian Tuohy, but he does a good job of explaining some of the inconsistencies in professional sports and their legitimacy. There’s a reason I’ve taken to call the Turkish league “Turkish Soccer Entertainment”, and I feel as if there will still be more manipulation as time goes on. Problem is, and this goes for just about any other professional sports league out there, does anybody really want to do anything about it? Sadly, the answer is no.
Dear Mr. Hill – I think you are thoroughly mistaken in saying that ie Galatasaray supporters are sending all the mails in order to pin down Fenerbahce. Totally wrong. We are sick and tired of the corruption in football in Turkey; and it has become a worse staged show than American Wrestling. If you will be so kind as to bother to have a few criminal findings translated to nglish; you’ll be amused. Football lovers of course will not take this s**t, and our choices are either we see action to see our football cleaned or we close our pay-tv accounts and say goodbye to our beloved football. Which actually will have the same impact, but with latency. All the parasites feeding off of the system will have to go elswhere as there will be much less juice to suck.
PS Kerim King, you are pathetic.
To Gheorghe Hagi, I did find your response laughable. I don’t even follow Turkish football that much and even I can see that the Galatasaray fans are doing something to see their rivals get screwed. It’s so obvious to even the most idiot savant of observers. How about getting those jailed journalists free first? You are Turkish so it’s obvious that you as well as others are proving Declan Hill right with that statement as to rival clubs screwing with other rivals. Other than that, you and your fellow Galatasaray fans are hypocritical.
I, as a fan of football, have not been supporting any Turkish team for a long time. These events have demonstrated why I was right. I agree Declan’s view on a previous post: For the sport’s sake top-level events like Olympics should not be organized by Turkey. If a country cannot punish the guilty or fight with corruption by itself then it should face the consequences.
For ‘the Great Attila’s point: I, as an anti-fascist first and foremost, think that the issue with journalists is much more important than football. But this does not mean that we should not react against both simultaneously. Obviously there are hardcore fanatics of Gala and other teams who *just* want to see Fenerbahce being punished. But most of the public in Turkey is fed up with general atmosphere surrounding Turkish football and want to see that the governing body of football (UEFA and FIFA) are not part of a global conspiracy (which I do not think but Turkish media suggests that Platini and Erdogan have a deal) and will punish TFF for the things Declan explained. I do not know why ‘the Great Attila’ generalizes like “You are Turkish so it’s obvious that you [... are] screwing with other rivals,” or “you and your fellow Galatasaray fans are hypocritical.” As far as I understand, Declan’s statement is that there are (possibly big) groups doing that, definitely not all the Turkish public or the Gala fans which I completely agree. I hope these events will not feed the rising xeno/islamo/turko-fobia in Europe which we do not need at all.
Burak wrote, “But most of the public in Turkey is fed up with general atmosphere surrounding Turkish football and want to see that the governing body of football (UEFA and FIFA) are not part of a global conspiracy (which I do not think but Turkish media suggests that Platini and Erdogan have a deal) and will punish TFF for the things Declan explained.”
Since the matches affected in the scandal are only in the domestic league, the only source of authority in this situation is the TFF. The problem is that the Turkish media have spread this fallacy that UEFA can ban the country’s clubs from its competitions for 3, 5, or 8 years (depending on whomever is speaking). UEFA can’t punish Turkey for affairs that was not within their jurisdiction, because all the supposed fixed matches happened under TFF watch. Considering that UEFA and the TFF are autonomous organizations, UEFA can’t rule on TFF affairs. UEFA is as corrupt as FIFA. Considering that the Dinamo Zagreb-Olympique Lyon 7-1 result from the Champions League never got investigated, that pretty much ended UEFA’s credibility as a fighter against match fixing right there. Even a French betting firm picked up on odd bets being placed and stopped taking bets on that game. But UEFA said that there was nothing wrong.
You writing that the public is fed up with the atmosphere surrounding football in the country is complete BS. They still watch the sport, they will continue to watch the sport. All this talk about people cancelling their decoder subscriptions and such is BS. Its typical Turkish talk, they’re just full of hot air, and no action.
Here’s another thing in regards to your last statement. Nobody is giving a crap about Turkey at this point. That is until they get either Euro 2020 or the 2020 Olympics. Then turcophobia will resonate with people.
Ata wrote “UEFA can’t punish Turkey for affairs that was not within their jurisdiction, because all the supposed fixed matches happened under TFF watch.”
I am not an expert on this, but Article 9 of UEFA Statutes reads:
“If, in the opinion of the Executive Committee, a Member Association has committed a serious breach of these Statutes or regulations or decisions made under them, the Executive Committee shall be entitled to suspend the membership of the Member Association with immediate effect.”
Also Article 5 of UEFA Disciplinary Regulations say:
“(1) Member associations and clubs, as well as their players, officials and members, shall conduct themselves according to the principles of loyalty, integrity and sportsmanship. (2) For example, a breach of these principles is committed by anyone: a) who engages in or attempts to engage in active or passive bribery and/or corruption.”
I think UEFA can invoke these, of course if they think the clubs are guilty and left unpunished by TFF.
Ata also wrote “You writing that the public is fed up with the atmosphere surrounding football in the country is complete BS. They still watch the sport, they will continue to watch the sport. All this talk about people cancelling their decoder subscriptions and such is BS. Its typical Turkish talk, they’re just full of hot air, and no action.”
They do not watch the sport now, they watch the ‘war’. Fener fans think the title would prove that they did not rig the matches last year. Others (Gala, Trabzon, etc.) feel that ‘unpunished’ Fener must be punished on the field (like unpunished -alleged- racist slur was ‘punished’ violently in Trabzon). It is not sports anymore (well, you may say in Turkey it never was which I do not completely disagree), and it will never be unless conscientious decisions are made.
I am a Galatasaray fan and I am not objective. I can’t be, I support Galatasaray so I am not supposed to be objective. I have a subjective perspective like everyone else who has written comments here.
But there is a line between being an outright fanatic and and a supporter who loves sports.
Anyone who loves sports for it’s spirit, competitiveness and challenge should be against match fixing and cheating in sports. This should be an universal perspective of all.
So the question here is: have Fenerbahce and the other clubs that are indicted have committed these charges or not? Let’s leave all the other conspiracy theories and the probable reasons behind the investigation out. Have they committed these crimes?
I read a hell lot of documents, I have read testimonials, confessions and I am sorry but it is apparent. Anyone who reads these documents would come to the conclusion that there have been occasions where match fixing occurred beyond reasonable doubt. I would argue with anyone who claims otherwise, in any platform. Especially the two games; Fenerbahce vs IBB and Genclerbirligi vs Fenerbahce, it is so open even the so called Ethics Committee couldn’t cover it up.
Ata is especially critical of the government, Gulen movement and he is mentioning some trials such as Ergenekon, Balyoz that are highly political. As a Turkish citizen I am very disturbed with these as well. But to correlate Fenerbahce and these doesn’t seem right. Again the question here is whether all these accusations are fabricated or not?
Aziz Yildirim, the Fenerbahce president who is in the focus, would Ata vouch for him? He is one of the darkest figures ever in Turkish football. He has connections with leaders of organized crime, he has been intimidating media. He got the journalists who criticized him fired. He instructed gangsters to beat Fenerbahce General Assembly members who were opposing him. He even let his men beat his own goalkeeper Rustu Recber. He has been trying to manipulate Turkish football in a machiavellian way since becoming a president. I don’t want Aziz Yildirim and these kind of figures in sports, just like I protested against two Galatasaray presidents who appointed Adnan Sezgin.
And the other point about UEFA and FIFA cannot interfere. That is not true, we have what happened in Greece as an example before us. Also is TFF autonomous any more? Of course not. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has been deciding who the president of TFF would be for the last several terms and according to Aziz Yildirim he had influence over the prime minister on that issue. First it was Hasan Dogan, when he passed away Mahmut Ozgener, than Mehmet Ali Aydinlar and finally Yildirim Demiroren. They were all appointed by Mr. Erdogan. He is the one behind the ludicrous idea that clubs should not be punished for the actions of executives. And Yildirim Demiroren did as he has ordered.
So UEFA and FIFA has every right to interfere in order to maintain the integrity of football. Why should they endanger European Football for Turkey? What successes do we have? What is the leverage we have over European football? If they succumb to politicians’ requests and match fixing in Turkey, how can they protect the game or even set an example for the other countries?
Here are some questions for all to answer:
1- Why has legislation 6222 been changed?
2- Why has Artcile 58 has been changed? Why Fenerbahce (Fenerbahce repeatedly announced that they were against this change) and Besiktas did not appeal like Galatasaray, Trabzonspor and Bursaspor so that this change could be canceled?
3- Why Ethical Committee’s decision has been changed?
4- Who are the members of PFDK and the TFF Arbitration Board?
5- Who is Ulker? What does Ulker means for Fenerbahce?
6- Why photos of banners against Gulen movement in mayday parades removed from Fenerbahce official website? Why Nihat Ozdemir apologized for these images?
7- Why the CAS lawsuit against UEFA and TFF has been recalled?
8- How come Aziz Yildirim has been acquitted by TFF Ethical Committee and Ilhan Eksioglu has been chosen as the scapegoat?
Once we answer all these questions, we will reach the truth. By the way when I started the petition for We Want Clean Football, I said “regardless of the colors”, because there were reports that Galatasaray was involved as well.
In below PDF link you’ll find out ethics committee’s two reports. One from August 2011 another from May 2012. In left column you can see the first report which explicitly identifies Aziz Yildirim and the gang as main actors in match fixing scandals.
http://s14.directupload.net/images/120509/8fbfkhbu.pdf
In right column same report has changed and this time Aziz Yildirim is as innocent as a new born baby. One can see that two reports are 100% opposite to each other while the evidences remain the same across two reports.
Obviously Yildirim Demiroren has ordered to Ethics Committee to a write new report which there all traces of match fixing are removed.
Yildirim Demiroren and his TFF (Turkish Football Federation) has become a laundry to clean all corruption attributed to Fenerbahce and other teams. What else can be said where both TFF & Ethics Committee are deeply corrupted?
To Burak, UEFA made it clear from their statement in January that the responsibility of punishing clubs lay solely with the TFF. They have no jurisdiction over the case that only involved domestic matches. All these disiciplinary code article you mention only apply to UEFA competitions only. Love how the Turkish 2+2=5 thinking comes into play here.
http://www.uefa.com/uefa/aboutuefa/news/newsid=1739226.html
Also, after reason those ethics committee reports, they say things which accuse clubs but offer up no evidence to back it up.
http://en.cihan.com.tr/caption/UEFA-reiterates-zero-tolerance-to-match-fixing-amid-Turkey-s-scandal-CHNjU0NjU3LzI=
Hi Ata,
I was hoping to have some answers from you. Never mind, above you may find a link to Infantino’s remarks. This was only one of his remarks warning the federation. Just do a little research and you will find more warnings. We will see all together what UEFA will do in the coming days.
Again, you are wrong and the statement from January was the end all be all. It’s in the TFF jurisdiction. Otherwise, UEFA would have to take action against a heck of a lot of other countries, especially from eastern Europe. There is nothing that UEFA can do and the matter is finished.
We agree to disagree. You have to look into what happened to Kavala and Volou that will give you an idea.
Time will show who is right, who is wrong. Still no answers to my questions… They were. It very hard come on…
Nice to see the typical denialist approach taken by Fener supporters.
Are there claims which were based on solid proofs, your denialist will tell you over and over again how they are free of guilt, instead the claimers are guilty. Truth is determined by how strongly you deny and how strongly you accuse the others. The 1915-events “Meds-Yeghern” is a famous case to exemplify this. However you try, solid deniers would tell you that the Armenians were the guilty party instead. Their ancestors could not possibly have made anything wrong — a fact which does not require a proof. They cannot separate themselves from their country/club/party/movement. Any “insult” is therefore personalized. Note that this way of defending is basically national/local — mere propaganda.
Fener defence is by no means different. Their leader could not possibly be wrong by any meaning of the word. If somebody was corrupt, it was definitely not them. Instead all the other teams are guilty. Sociogeny of Fener, as a team, resembles the sociogeny of Turkey: complete allegiance to the all-powerful leader. Fenerbahce resemble what they hate: AKP and Erdogan. An all-powerful leader with millions of followers. This explains how hard it is to infiltrate Fener (a conspiracy theory which most Fener fans believe) or even punish them. Here is a wonderful quote from an outline of “The Prince”:
“The Ottoman Empire, Machiavelli advises Lorenzo, would be difficult to conquer. A potential conqueror will not be invited into the country by any of the great nobles of the state, nor could he hope for a revolt by the ministers. Since they’re all slaves and dependents of their master, it is difficult to corrupt them, and even if they are corrupted, they can’t arouse the common people. Whoever attacks the Turks, therefore, must expect to find them united and must depend wholly upon his own forces, and not upon help from within the country.”
Fener fans are united in their denial in such a way that no European team can imagine. The Turkish media now writes testimonials on this so-called wonderful support without commenting on its ethical integrity.
My point: the case against Fener must be tried and if found guilty they must be punished. TFF cannot, did not, will not do that. UEFA has the means to do that (see my previous post). Contrary to what Ata says
“They have no jurisdiction over the case that only involved domestic matches. All these disiciplinary code article you mention only apply to UEFA competitions only. Love how the Turkish 2+2=5 thinking comes into play here.”
UEFA is able to punish Associations which do not follow the UEFA regulations even considering domestic matches. Article 9 of UEFA statutes cited above is very clear. Ata’s remark exemplifies yet another dimension of denialism.
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