Oğuz Doğan, a former police officer dismissed from his job over alleged links to Gülen movement, has died by suicide in the northern province of Samsun, Turkish media reported on Monday.
Doğan, 37, who was fired over a month ago, took his own life by jumping from his apartment balcony.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been targeting followers of the Gülen movement, inspired by the late Muslim cleric Fethullah Gülen, since the corruption investigations of December 17-25, 2013, which implicated then-prime minister Erdoğan, his family and his inner circle.
Dismissing the investigations as a Gülenist coup and conspiracy against his government, Erdoğan designated the movement as a terrorist organization and began to target its members. He intensified the crackdown on the movement following an abortive putsch on July 15, 2016 that he accused Gülen of masterminding. Gülen and the movement strongly deny involvement in the coup attempt or any terrorist activity.
Following the failed coup in 2016, the Turkish government declared a state of emergency and carried out a massive purge of state institutions under the pretext of an anti-coup fight.
Over 130,000 public servants, including 4,156 judges and prosecutors, as well as 24,706 members of the armed forces were summarily removed from their jobs for alleged membership in or relationships with “terrorist organizations” by emergency decree-laws subject to neither judicial nor parliamentary scrutiny.
Doğan is survived by his wife and child.
Former public servants were not only fired from their jobs but also banned from working again in the public sector and getting a passport to seek employment abroad. The government also made it difficult for them to work formally in the private sector. Notes were put on the social security database about dismissed public servants to deter potential employers.
In recent years, some individuals dismissed over alleged Gülen links have been reinstated, yet this process has often come too late. Numerous cases have surfaced where dismissed individuals, facing severe emotional and financial strain, have died by suicide or otherwise passed away before their reinstatement.
