‘771 people work for Turkey's media authority RTÜK, they watch only 5 channels’

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The 2022 budgets of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Culture and Tourism were debated at the General Assembly of the Grand National Assembly of Turkey yesterday (December 13).

Taking the floor during the debates on the budget of Radio and Television Supreme Council (RTÜK), Turkey's media watchdog, main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) İzmir MP Atila Sertel criticized the fines imposed on the critical radio and TV channels in the country.

Referring to the President and Justice and Development Party (AKP) Chair, Sertel suggested calling the RTÜK "Tayyip Erdoğan Supreme Council" rather than "the Radio and Television Supreme Council".

According to Sertel, "771 work at the RTÜK, which fulfills all instructions coming from the [Presidential] palace." He explained that while 605 of these personnel are civil servants, 166 are workers. While there are eight department heads, there are 46 vice department heads in total. And a vice department head's monthly salary is between 11 and 15 thousand lira.

Sertel said that "a total of 9 million 120 thousand lira is paid from the RTÜK budget for these personnel expenses a year."

Asking "what these 771 people do at the RTÜK", the main opposition MP answered his question briefly as follows:

Let me tell you: There are five channels: Halk TV, KRT, TELE1, FOX TV and TV5. These 771 people watch these five channels. Because all fines that they impose are for these five channels and some local channels. They have also imposed some fines on local channels, but they have imposed major fines on these five channels. The job of these 771 people is to follow the five channels and to impose fines on them.

The MP criticized the RTÜK "for not giving the slightest warning" to some pro-government channels such as A Haber, 24 TV, Akit, Kanal 7, Ülke TV, TGRT and TV Net, "which curse the CHP Chair [Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu] and hurl insults at both him and the CHP."

According to CHP's Atila Sertel, in the nine month-period until September 2021, the RTÜK imposed 18 fines on TELE1, 18 severe fines on Halk TV, nine fines on FOX TV and nine fines on KRT TV.

Addressing the ruling party, Sertel said, "As long as you walk along the ones who obey you and lick your boots, you will never ever do the right thing. Those fines of yours are unjust, unlawful, baseless, inappropriate, null and void. You will answer for those fines." (HA/SD)