Melih Gökçek

This article is about the mayor of Ankara. For the football player named Melih Gökçek (Tita), see Sidney Cristiano dos Santos.

Melih Gökçek
Mayor of Ankara
Incumbent
Assumed office 27 March 1994
Preceded by	Vedat Aydın
Personal details
Born	October 20, 1948 Keçiören, Ankara
Nationality	Turkish
Political party	Justice and Development Party
Alma mater	Gazi University
Religion	Islam
Website	MelihGokcek.com.tr

İbrahim Melih Gökçek (born on October 20, 1948, in Keçiören, Ankara, Turkey) is a Turkish politician who has been the mayor of Ankara since 1994. Between 1991-1994, he was a MP. Gökçek has won municipal elections in 1994, 1999, 2004, and 2009.

Early life

The Gökçek family, originally from Halfeti, moved to Gaziantep for father Ahmet Gökçek's career as a lawyer. Having his primary, secondary and high school education in Gaziantep, Melih Gökçek graduated from Gazi University, College of Journalism, in Ankara. He worked as Parliament Correspondent and newspaper representative. Gökçek completed his military service as a Reserve Officer at Güzelyurt in Northern Cyprus.^[1]

Political career

After he returned from military service, Gökçek set up a business. Then from 1984 to 1989 he acted as the Mayor of Keçiören, a district in Ankara.^[1]

The following two years Melih Gökçek ran the Social Services and Child Protection Society as the General Director between the years 1989-1991. In 1991 he entered the parliament as Ankara MP for the Welfare Party. While he was a MP during local elections in 1994, he stood for the Mayor Office of Ankara Metropolitan Municipality and won the election. He was elected for the same duty again in 1999 as the candidate of the Virtue Party and became the first person to be successively elected as the Mayor of Metropolitan Municipality for two times in the history of Ankara.^[1] He then joined the Justice and Development Party and was elected for the same duty for third time in 2004 and even a fourth time in 2009 and thus became the first person to be successively elected as the Mayor of the Metropolitan Municipality for four times in the history of Ankara.^[2] Gökçek is also the first mayor in the history of Ankara who was elected four times in a row.^[2]

Personal life

He supports Ankaraspor in Ankara. He is the honorary chairman of MKE Ankaragücü. Football and photography are the greatest hobbies of Gökçek, who is married with Nevin Gökçek, and has two sons, Ahmet and Osman.^[2]

Achievements and Awards

Ankara received certain international prizes during his office during Gökçek's administration.

These awards include the "European Flag of Honour" (2001) and the "European Plaque of Honour" (2003). On 10 October 2009 Gökçek received the "Europe Prize" by the President of the European Parliament, Luis Marie de Puig, at the European Parliament in Strasbourg. It is the most prestigious award for cities and municipalities at a global level for examplary projects in the urban, social, cultural and international relations area.^[3]

The Greater Municipality of Ankara received three awards for its city projects by the OICC which has four prize categories during an award ceremony held in Doha in May 2010 with the participation of 170 representatives from 54 different countries. It won the first prizes in the “Urban and Regional Planning” as well as the “Landscaping” categories for the “North Ankara Urban Renewal Project” as well as the “Göksu Park” project and the second prize in the “Environment, Conservation and Sustainable Development” category for the “Mogan Park” project.^[4]

The municipality of Turkey's capital city Ankara was also presented with the World Water Organization's (WWO) "Best Practice Award" with its "Kizilirmak River Project" on 8 April 2010. WWO presented its "World Water Awards" during a ceremony held at the United Nations (UN) headquarters in New York, USA, on the first day of a two-day international conference on "Water and Global Health". Speaking at the ceremony, WWO's board member Elaine Valdov said that Ankara had experienced a serious water shortage problem from 2007 to 2008, and "Kizilirmak River Rehabilitation Project" had been initiated under the guidance of Ankara Mayor Melih Gökçek to solve the matter. "This water project has been a perfect example that displays the cooperation between public institutions and the private sector," Valdov said.^[5]

Criticism

In 2003 Gökçek tried to ban the pedestrian crossing in the city's busiest crossroads, demanding that pedestrians walk through the underpasses. Activists protested the city center being closed off completely from pedestrians ^{[6][7][8][9] [10]} and declared that unilaterally taking such a decision is against law. Gökçek announced that he would make a referendum. The court eventually decided the referendum was unlawful.^[11] He has also closed the middle 4 lanes of a major road and constructed a recreation complex on them (called 'Gökkuşağı', Rainbow).^[12] As being placed in between the city's busiest lanes, the cafes and shops in the complex has never been put in use. The complex has cost 3.610 million Turkish liras, (approximately 3.11 million dollars), and has been sitting empty since 2005. ^[13]

During 2007 water crisis of Ankara, he suggested the water be transported from Kızılırmak.^[14] The faculty of Middle East Technical University (METU)'s Department of Environmental Engineering tested the water and concluded that the samples contained toxins and were not suitable for drinking.^{[15][16][5][17]}

References

1. ^ ^{a b c} "Melih Gökçek (1948 - .... )" (in (Turkish)). kimkimdir.gen.tr. http://www.kimkimdir.gen.tr/kimkimdir.php?id=581. Retrieved 2011-01-15. 
2. ^ ^{a b c} "Melih Gökçek ( 20.10.1948)" (in (Turkish)). biyografi.net. http://www.biyografi.net/kisiayrinti.asp?kisiid=775. Retrieved 2011-01-15. 
3. ^ "Ankara wins the 2009 Europe Prize". Assembly.coe.int. 2009-04-29. http://assembly.coe.int/ASP/Press/StopPressView.asp?ID=2169. Retrieved 2010-09-22. 
4. ^ http://www.haber2000.com/haberdetay.asp?id=43004
5. ^ ^{a b} http://www.turkishweekly.net/news/101019/world-water-organization-awards-ankara-municipality-39-s-water-project.html
6. ^ "A press release from the Architects' Chamber of Ankara about the underpasses" (PDF). http://www.mimarlarodasiankara.org/dosya/D-katli%20kavsak%20sube.pdf. Retrieved 2010-09-22. 
7. ^ "Chamber of Civil Engineers of Ankara: "underpasses are not a solution to Ankara's traffic problems"". Yapi.com.tr. 2009-02-20. http://www.yapi.com.tr/Haberler/trafik-sorunu-katli-kavsaklarla-cozulemez_66772.html. Retrieved 2010-09-22. 
8. ^ "Hürriyet Newspaper | Corruption stays on Ankara agenda". Hurriyet.com.tr. http://www.hurriyet.com.tr/english/domestic/10599315.asp. Retrieved 2010-09-22. 
9. ^ "Today's Zaman | Kılıçdaroğlu, Gökçek clash over corruption claims". Todayszaman.com. 2008-12-19. http://www.todayszaman.com/tz-web/detaylar.do?load=detay&link=161686. Retrieved 2010-09-22. 
10. ^ "Article from the website of an activist group "Ankara Platform"" (in (Turkish)). Ankaramplatformu.org. 2008-07-16. http://www.ankaramplatformu.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=91:kizilay-yaya-gectler-muecadeles-&catid=44:blge-belge&Itemid=18. Retrieved 2010-09-22. 
11. ^ "Radikal Newspaper, "people from Ankara's rural areas were transported to vote in the referendum", "referendum declared invalid"". Radikal.com.tr. 2003-10-26. http://www.radikal.com.tr/haber.php?haberno=93351. Retrieved 2010-09-22. 
12. ^ www2.tbmm.gov.tr/d23/7/7-5531s.pdf
13. ^ "Hurriyet Newspaper | Gökçek's Rainbow Project Became a Fiasco". Ankara.hurriyet.com.tr. http://ankara.hurriyet.com.tr/ankara/5815084.asp?gid=140. Retrieved 2010-09-22. 
14. ^ "Consumers' Association, "Kızılırmak water is not drinkable"". Tudef.org.tr. http://www.tudef.org.tr/index.php?aid=190. Retrieved 2010-09-22. 
15. ^ Press release from METU's Environmental Engineering Department
16. ^ "METU's president Ural Akbulut: "Kızılırmak water contains 2 times more Arsenic than the limit"". Guncel.net. http://www.guncel.net/gundem/turkiye/2008/06/12/odtu-melih-gokcek-i-yalanladi.htm. Retrieved 2010-09-22. 
17. ^ "Radikal newspaper | Gökçek takes revenge from University over arsenic claims". Radikal.com.tr. 2008-07-17. http://www.radikal.com.tr/Default.aspx?aType=Detay&ArticleID=888764&Date=17.07.2008&CategoryID=77. Retrieved 2010-09-22. 

External links

• Official website
• Twitter account
• Melih Gökçek ile ilgili haberler

Political offices
Preceded by Vedat Aydın	Mayor of Ankara 1994–present	Succeeded by incumbent

Persondata
Name	Gokcek, Ibrahim Melih
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	1948-10-20
Place of birth	Keçiören, Ankara
Date of death
Place of death