Turkish students and professors rise against Erdogan-appointed rector of Boğaziçi University

On Monday, students at the Bosphorus University in the city of Istanbul clashed with Turkish police forces at the expense of the new rector appointed by President Erdogan.  

The police dispersed the students with tear gas and rubber bullets, and temporarily detained about twenty of them.  

Erdogan, as president of the republic, has the right to appoint the rectors of the universities, but the students criticised the decision to appoint Melih Bulut as the new rector because he belongs to the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP).  

Bulut, who took up the post last Saturday, is a PhD in Business Administration and took up his first political post with the AKP as the president of the Sariyer district in the city of Istanbul in 2002. In the 2009 elections, he was the candidate of the party in Atahesir, another district of the same city. In 2015, he was the candidate of the Islamist formation in the parliamentary elections.  

The students denounced that this is a step to restrict academic freedoms as it has happened in other universities where rectors close to the AKP have been appointed. “We do not accept it as it clearly violates academic freedom and scientific autonomy as well as the democratic values of our university," they said in a statement shared on social media.  

The appointment was “yet another case of many ongoing anti-democratic practices since 2016,” they said, referring to a large-scale crackdown since a failed coup five years ago.

The students hung a sign on the door of the Rectorate building saying: "This building was sealed by the Bosphorus students due to the appointment of Melih Bulut from the AKP as the Rector", and chanted "AKP, take your hands off our university". The student protest was joined by several academics of the university who are also critical of the decision of the Turkish president.  

The professors of the university offered a statement in which they warned that "for the first time after the military dictatorship of the 1980s, an external rector was appointed" to the university. "We do not accept it as it clearly violates academic freedom and scientific autonomy as well as the democratic values of our university," they said, recalling that in 2012 university institutions agreed that all academic administrators would be determined by election rather than appointment, even if someone from the university itself was appointed.  

Omar Celik, AKP spokesperson, defended Bulut’s appointment as “legal” and critiicised the "political fanaticism" that in his view characterised the protesters.  

"It is not a crime for a person to have a political opinion,” he told reporters following a meeting of the ruling party chaired by Erdogan", and assured that they did not make the election based on their political affiliation. Furthermore, he denied that the academic freedom was in danger.  

The provincial leader of the main opposition party, the Republican People's Party, Canan Kaftancıoğlu, who participated in the protest, thanked the students' struggle on Twitter. 

Melih Bulut, who in the past had to face accusations of plagiarism in his doctoral thesis, is now in his third term as rector after spending time at both Halic Private University and Istinye University, both located in Istanbul like Bosphorus University.  

The new rector posted a message on his Twitter profile encouraging him to oppose all kinds of initiatives that distance the university from scientific production, which he said is his "main job", and spoke of the need to put the university back in the global top 500. "Let's not forget that we are all in the same boat," he said in reference to the protests.