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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been quietly acquitted in a long‑running corruption case dating back to his time as Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality (İBB) mayor, after a dormant file was reactivated and concluded without public attention, according to judicial sources cited in Turkish media.
The development was first reported by the left-wing outlet Haber Sol, published on 12 December. The report draws on details previously uncovered by Alican Uludağ of DW Türkçe, who traced how the so‑called “Akbil case” was revived and finalized.
The Akbil case concerns allegations from the late 1990s and early 2000s that corruption worth 2.6 trillion Turkish lira (in then‑current value) was committed through Akbil, the electronic ticketing system used in Istanbul’s public transport network. At the time, prosecutors detained 65 people and brought charges against 37. In 2003, the Üsküdar 2nd High Criminal Court (Ağır Ceza Mahkemesi) acquitted 29 defendants; proceedings against others were dropped due to death or being abroad.
Erdoğan, then the former mayor and by that time leader of the AKP, along with his successor as mayor Ali Müfit Gürtuna and several AKP lawmakers, was not judged in that 2003 ruling. Because Erdoğan, Mehmet Mustafa Açıkalın, Mikail Arslan and İdris Naim Şahin were sitting members of parliament, the court separated their files and sent summaries of proceedings (fezleke) to the Grand National Assembly, invoking Article 83 of the Constitution on parliamentary immunity.
Erdoğan later served as prime minister and, in 2014, became president. Under Turkey’s constitutional framework, his immunity continued in his new role. Meanwhile, the Üsküdar courthouse was closed and its files transferred to the newly created Istanbul Anadolu Courthouse, where the Akbil file was assigned to the Istanbul Anadolu 6th High Criminal Court.
According to DW Türkçe’s reporting based on judicial sources, Erdoğan’s lawyers petitioned this court, arguing that since all other defendants in the Akbil case had been acquitted, the file concerning Erdoğan should also be taken off the shelf and concluded with an acquittal. The then‑presiding judge reportedly objected, saying the case could not be heard while Erdoğan enjoyed presidential immunity under the Constitution.
Sources say that following this objection, the presiding judge was replaced and a new panel was formed. The reconstituted bench proceeded to examine the case and issued an acquittal for Erdoğan. The Istanbul Anadolu Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office did not appeal, making the verdict final. The decision was reportedly handed down after Erdoğan’s re‑election as president in 2021.
Legal sources cited by DW Türkçe acknowledged the constitutional tension, noting that the question of how a sitting president could be tried by an ordinary criminal court was discussed in the judgment. They said the court referred to the president’s “consent” to the process, though no detailed reasoning has yet been published.
The Constitution’s Article 105 states that a president can only be tried before the Constitutional Court sitting as the Supreme Court (Yüce Divan), and only after a multi‑stage process initiated and approved by supermajority votes in parliament. For that reason, the manner in which the Akbil file was resolved is likely to draw scrutiny from constitutional lawyers.
The same court also later tried former interior minister İdris Naim Şahin, after his parliamentary term ended, and acquitted him in relation to the Akbil allegations, according to the same reports.