Bingöl wrote in the article, which appeared in the March-April issue of political magazine Yeni Hayat, that he had filed corruption charges against quite a number of people, including individuals in influential positions.

“I was doing my job. They don’t say in documents ‘yes I have stolen but I am a judge, a general or a deputy and you cannot touch me.’ I just saw some corruption issues and reported them.”

These words prompted prosecutor İsmail Onaran to start an investigation against Bingöl for insulting the judicial system, currently a crime under the Turkish Penal Code’s (TCK) controversial Article 301. It is not yet clear if Onaran was given permission by the justice minister to open the case.

In late April Parliament approved a long-awaited amendment to Article 301. The reform makes it a crime to insult the Turkish nation rather than “Turkishness” and the justice minister’s permission is required to open a case under 301. Insulting the Turkish Republic, Parliament, the government and judicial institutions were also criminalized under Article 301.

Bingöl fought against corruption in the acquisition of land and housing in the early 2000s. In 2004, he was heading a team to investigate corruption allegations against several municipal officials in the Beylikdüzü district of İstanbul and revealed that land which was inexpensively purchased from the state for the purpose of building low-income housing projects had been given to several influential individuals, including judges and prosecutors.

As a result of his investigation, Beylikdüzü municipal officials were taken into custody and some were jailed, including Mayor Orhan Tıraşoğlu. However, Bingöl said most of the investigation files were lost in the hands of prosecutors for “unknown reasons.”

Bingöl started to write more about the events of the past after he retired from the military.

“Hundreds of thousands of apartments have been built for low-income families. Land was also allocated for that purpose, but these have been plundered by some corporations, the mafia, judges, deputies and journalists who illegally claimed that they were in the category of low-income families,” Bingöl wrote in his latest article.

http://www.todayszaman.com/tz-web/detaylar.do?load=detay&link=142487

Zeki Bingöl

Türk İşi Mortgace / 775 Sayılı Gecekondu Yasası ve Uygulaması
Zeki Bingöl
Togan Yayıncılık / Araştırma İnceleme Dizisi