Turkey: TGS elects its youngest president with a gender balanced board

Journalists Union of Turkey has elected the youngest president of his history during its 21th General Meeting. The equal gender balance at the new TGS board is maintained with an age average of 35 years. EFJ-IFJ and DJV (Germany) representatives shared solidarity messages at the General Meeting and met with banned media representatives.

Journalists Union of Turkey (TGS) organised its 21th Ordinary General Meeting, chaired by Canan Onurer(President of Basin-Sen in Cyprus), in Istanbul on 8 and 9 October 2016 with the participation of members, delegates and international guests. The General Meeting elected Gökhan Durmus (former TGS Istanbul Branch) at 33 years becoming the union’s youngest president of his history. The new TGS board is composed of 3 women and 3 men.

Speaking at the opening the incumbent TGS President Ugur Güç said : “Turkey is going through a very heavy period with no democracy and no freedom of the press in Turkey. After the coup attempt of 15th July, the government imposed the state of emergency and increased the pressure on opposition and independent groups. I’m convinced that the new TGS leadership will continue our struggle against these authorities continuously destroying democracy and freedom of the press in our country”.

The European and International Federations of Journalists (EFJ-IFJ) were represented by Mehmet Koksalduring the TGS Annual Meeting. In his speech to the delegates, he reminded that “press freedom violations in Turkey are closely followed in Europe”. “We have many worries for the safety of journalists in Turkey. The TGS struggle is shared, backed and supported by EFJ-IFJ at the international level. We demand to end this climate of repression in the media, to reopen the banned televisions, newspapers and radio channels and to release all arrested journalists”, he added.

Attending the General Meeting as a guest-speaker, Frank Überall, the President of the German Journalists’ Association (DJV) said “killing or reducing press freedom is toxic for society! Therefore, German, European und Turkish governments have to find a way back to stress out that human rights are not to be punished. That Turkey has go get back to real democracy. DJV, together with EFJ, will continue to support TGS and expand their involvement for a better press freedom environment for a Turkey in Europe”.

The new board of TGS for the next 3 years has been elected on Sunday 9th October and is composed of :

  • Gökhan Durmuş, President
  • İlkay Akkaya, General Secretary
  • Can Uğur, Treasurer
  • Seyhan Kurtman, Deputy
  • Mustafa Kuleli, Recruitment General Secretary
  • Olcay Büyüktaş Akça, Education General Secretary

Substitute members to the board, members of the control and disciplinary committee have also been elected for the same period.

After the TGS General Assembly, representatives from the European and International Federation of Journalists (EFJ-IFJ) and the German Journalists’ Association (DJV) organised a special meeting with senior representatives of IMC TV, Hayatin Sesi TV, Özgür Radyo, TV 10, the recently banned TV and radio channels.

Photo Credit : Mehmet Koksal / EFJ

The article was originally published by European Federation of Journalists (EFJ)