Journalists Çelenk, Değirmenci Fired from Doğan Group

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Doğan Group media outlets Posta newspaper and Hürriyet newspaper have each fired a journalist, who declared their opinion that they would vote against presidential system in the constitutional amendment referendum.

Kanal D morning news reporter İrfan Değirmenci was sacked for having tweeted that he would vote “no” in the referendum.

In a statement, Kanal D emphasizing Doğan Group’s principle of “impartiality” said “He openyl became a party to a publicly disputed matter. For this reason, we cancelled the labor contract with him”.

On a CNN Türk live program on January 22, 2017, Posta columnist Hakan Çelenk briefly said:

“I am an ill-intended president. Defend the system against me, I will assume the office, I will be involved in corruption. If anyone attempts to remove from my post, I will dissolve the parliament if I am ill-intended. Then I will have the deputies be elected and call a general election”.

Çelenk was sacked after these statements.

Fatih Çekirge had announced his vote would be “yes”

Firing of Değirmenci sparked reactions on social media.

Stressing Hürriyet newspaper columnist Fatih Çekirge’s article in which he said “As a person who has been advocating the presidential system for years, I say ‘yes’”, the social media users asked why the “impartiality” principle doesn’t apply to Çekirge. (NV/EKN/TK)