Turkey’s leading mafia boss, Sedat Peker, has now become a new YouTube star.
In exile, he makes videos and posts them sin YouTube-kanal every Sunday morning at half past seven.
His accusations and confessions about corruption, murder, rape, drug trafficking and human trafficking are now shaking the whole country.
“My dear friends, brothers and sisters! As I promised, I’m here again. We’ll have a lot of fun today! ”
This is how his videos begin.
– So far, he has posted nine videos on his channel. Photo: Private
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Although the videos are posted very early on Sunday morning, they are watched by millions in just a few hours.
During one Sunday, one of his videos was viewed ten million times, on his official YouTube channel alone.
The videos are ad-free. To get more viewers, he also allows everyone to share the videos further. Then they are seen millions more times on YouTube, Twitter, Facebook and TikTok.
– This is how Sedat Peker gets many viewers in front of the screen on a Sunday morning. Photo: Mehmet Guzel
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Shower in blood
Sedat Peker is 46 years old and one of the most important mafia leaders in Turkey. He has been accused of mafia activities several times and has been in prison for more than ten years. Pointer was released in 2014.
After being released, he became a more visible and well-known figure in the country.
In 2016, Peker threatened the 1,288 academics who signed a petition urging the Turkish government to halt human rights abuses against the country’s Kurdish population.
“We want to shower in their blood,” Peker said.
He was reviewed by academics, but the court did not find him guilty. After another gang leader, Alaattin Cakıcı, was released from prison in 2020, the situation has changed for him.
– Silivri Prison, 70 kilometers west of Istanbul, is the country’s largest prison where Sedat Peker was imprisoned. Photo: Huseyin Aldemir
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After a while, there was talk that Peker had fled Turkey. Then came a clear message from him:
– No, I have not fled. I have moved abroad to study, he said.
Serious allegations
But on May 2, he began making videos in which he makes serious allegations. In the first video, he claimed that the interior minister, Suleyman Soylu, promised to bring him back to the country, but suddenly the police came to his door in Turkey, where Peker’s wife and three children live. Peker himself was abroad.
According to him, this was the last drop that made the cup overflow.
In the videos, he makes serious allegations. He tells, among other things, how around five tonnes of cocaine came by sea from Venezuela to Turkey, how many trucks full of weapons were sent to jihadist Islamists in Syria during the war and how corruption takes place in the public sector.
– Suleyman Soylu is Turkey’s interior minister. Photo: Pool New
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The Minister of the Interior has himself denied for the charges and wrote that his allegations are just nonsense.
People sound the alarm
His videos have changed Sunday routines across the country. At night, people put alarms on the phones to wake up at half past seven instead of sleeping.
– Now it is seven o’clock on a Sunday morning, and we are waiting for a new video from Sedat Peker. God, why did you not create me as a fish in Norway? write a Twitter user.
– Before, we used to make plans to go for a walk, barbecue or picnic on Sundays. Now I set the alarm for Sedat Peker. Thanks politics, writes the other.
The third shows a screenshot of the phone where he sets three different alarms in case he does not wake up from one alarm.
The books break records
The way Peker tells things is very untraditional.
When he tells about an event, he uses philosophy, psychology, history and literature. He recommends books to viewers, and the books he recommends beat sales records and bookstores are empty.
Everything in the videos also has a meaning. After he posted videos, journalists made videos about what he “really” says and means in that episode. These videos are also viewed millions of times.
Special power
Burak Bilgehan Özpek is an academic and teaches political science in Turkey. He tells TV 2 that Sedat Peker now has a unique power and influence in the population.
According to Özpek, Turkey has become very polarized in recent years, and various groups such as Kurds, ultra-secular, conservatives do not listen to each other.
– Burak Bilgehan Özpek is an academic and teaches political science. Photo: Private
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– What is special now is that he gets different groups to look at him at the same time. This is something we had not seen for a long time, says Özpek.
According to him, Peker’s way of telling is very special. Although he is a non-nationalist, the gang leader uses a language that the others do not feel threatened or excluded from, says the academic.
The other reason why people like Sedat Peker is that he makes a lot of money, and with that money he helps people through his network in society, says Özpek.
– He does not reject a person who asks him for help. He is an ultranationalist, but when he was in prison, for example, he gave money to a man who supports the PKK and who lacked a leg. This is how the man was able to afford a bone operation, Özpek says.
Sedat Peker is now in Dubai, but is constantly moving because after posting videos, his location is revealed.
Creative posts
The strange situation leads to many creative posts on social media, and people are discussing that what is happening in Turkey can now become an exciting series on Netflix.
– There is now talk that what is happening can be an exciting “Netflix series”. But no, we’m already in an interactive Netflix series. Nationalist mafia leader escapes from the police, we follow him directly and pray to God that he is not found and write ideas to him. We do not need anything more, writes a Twitter user.
The journalist behind the article, Aysun Yazici, is a journalist from Turkey who lives in exile in Norway. She is affiliated with TV 2’s foreign department.
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