Sedat Peker’s Revelations: Why Do They Never Go Beyond Gossip and Social Media?

Why do they never go beyond gossip and social media?

PUGAT’s authors answered for you how Sedat Peker’s revelations affect the government, the opposition and their supporters, taking into account the current state of the judiciary in the country.

Erdal Turna:

The public follows Sedat Peker’s statements with the curiosity of a cliffhanger serial. I suspect government supporters see these revelations as statements that could help cleanse their own party of its “filth”. Those opposed to the government, hearing from Peker’s mouth about the dirty dealings of names they already knew, say “It was obvious these people weren’t clean” and content themselves with the psychological satisfaction of being proved right. As for names they hear for the first time, they fall silent in astonishment: “What else will we learn? Just wait and see.”

Prosecutors’ habit of working on instruction whenever crime–mafia–state relations touch the domain of the political power has pushed the issue outside the realm of law. Government politicians and stakeholders, above all its leaders, regard ignoring the tangle of dark relations exposed by Peker’s statements as a requirement of their political stance or allegiance.

How to explain the “inadequate” reactions and “meaningless” silences of opposition politicians, I honestly do not know. Opposition figures who say “Peker’s revelations would bring down a government in a normal country” must know that Turkey is not a “normal” country. Leaving everything to the passage of time is not a sensible choice if the criminal relations spilled into the open are to be put to use before the law or the public.

The government is deliberately turning a deaf ear to Peker’s statements. The opposition, meanwhile, is unwittingly squandering the information about the dirty and dark network of relations that has come to light in the style of gossip. It would be a fantasy to expect a public that does not take to the streets, or is prevented from doing so, to protest the current economic conditions to play Don Quixote and keep a justice vigil in the streets so that Sedat Peker’s claims are pursued.

Murat Gülbahçe:

That Sedat Peker, one of the few names that come to mind in Turkey when “mafia” is mentioned, is now accepted as “a folk hero and apostle of democracy” stands before us as a significant sociological phenomenon. That people’s helplessness in the face of the regime leads them to seek salvation from a mafia leader is horrifying in itself. 

But more striking still is that, contrary to people’s favour, the judiciary is playing dead. Frankly, in an environment where law is dying in corrupt hands, the question of why Peker’s revelations have not been taken to court also remains up in the air. Until yesterday Peker was serving as an apparatus of the Erdoğan regime, with the approval of his own command centre, in return for benefits. 15 July is the peak of this partnership. These intricate connections are so full of grey areas that none of the parties wants to enter these forbidden zones. The corruption, murders and private videos he has revealed also have the effect of soap bubbles on social media. In Turkey, the country that consumes its agenda faster than any other in the world, they become a few days’ gossip.

In the end, the tip of the spear Peker holds also pierces himself and the clique he belongs to. Peker plays his role by the rules as a successful element of a planned intelligence operation. It seems that Peker will try to shape the political arena by making occasional outbursts as a counterweight to the regime.

My advice to those under 40 is not to read too much into such figures. Their concerns and agenda are very different.

Ali Çağlar:

The basic aim of a perception operation is to create a new attitude in the target audience or to reverse an existing one. According to Goebbels, the propaganda minister of Nazi Germany, in major propaganda campaigns the propagandist must have deep knowledge of his own society and of the opposing society, propaganda must be planned and executed from a single centre, and once the target audience’s attention has been caught, slogans must be repeated often.

On the other hand, for perception management to succeed, the target audience must not be aware of the attempts to persuade them. Because when people think they are being persuaded, they develop more counter-arguments and cling even more tightly to their current views, attitudes and behaviour.

To prevent this, Sedat Peker and the team supporting him use the method known in the literature as “grey propaganda”. Sedat Peker may be a suitable figure for grey propaganda, but the power centres facing him are using “black propaganda” with the means of the state. In black propaganda the source is concealed, intelligence units provide support in the background, and fake evidence and all kinds of lies are delivered to the masses through various media outlets.

Sedat Peker shares the information that comes into his hands, with evidence, so that investigations are opened into those concerned, but there is no reaction from the judiciary. In fact this is an incomplete reading, because in the current conjuncture Sedat Peker and the team behind him also know that the judiciary cannot act. The aim here is not so much to set the judiciary in motion as to shape public opinion. Note that Peker says “I will tear them off piece by piece”. This shows that Sedat Peker is acting like a true professional.