The zoning director in the Diyarbakir Bağlar Municipality, Fırat Kılıç was caught red-handed while taking a bribe of TRY1 million (app. €29,000) in November 2023. A bribery scheme started to unfold when a businessperson, the contractor Nusret Bekiranlı, reported to the police that he had been asked for a bribe by an employee in the directorate of urban planning in exchange for deciding on his construction application. He reported that the employee of the municipality asked him for TRY50,000 per flat and TRY5 million for the houses he would build. Following this report, the investigation was launched in October 2023, and law enforcement conducted a sting operation, resulting in the arrest of Fırat Kılıç and the deputy mayor Sıddık Aycıl in November 2023. Previously, following the request of the Diyarbakır chief public prosecutor’s office, the Diyarbakır 1st Criminal Court of peace decided in October 2023 to allow the monitoring of activities of the three suspects for three weeks, including the mayor Hüseyin Beyoğlu, Sıddık Aycıl and Fırat Kılıç.

The resulting audio and video surveillance materials were included in the indictment, such as the bribe negotiations in Fırat Kılıç’s office with Nusret Bekiranlı, which also implicates Mayor Beyoğlu. The indictment states that the bribe payment was delivered to Fırat Kılıç and, on the same day, the documents that had not previously been processed for four and a half months, were processed by Sıddık Aycıl and referred to the relevant committee. Diyarbakır chief public prosecutor's office prepared the indictment regarding this case, requesting a prison sentence from five to ten years for Hüseyin Beyoğlu, Sıddık Aycıl and Fırat Kılıç, based on the provisions of the Turkish penal code, which regulates extortion. The 10th high criminal court accepted the indictment in January 2024. On 8 May, during the first hearing at the 10th high criminal court, the court panel decided to release the detained deputy mayor, Sıddık Aycıl, under judicial control, and to continue the detention of Fırat Kılıç and to maintain the judicial control and foreign travel ban for former mayor Hüseyin Beyoğlu. The last hearing, which took place on 25 October, former mayor Hüseyin Beyoğlu and Fırat Kılıç, who worked in the planning and urbanism department of Bağlar Municipality, were sentenced to three years and nine months in prison for the crime of extortion through coercion in the bribery investigation they were being tried for.

Media reports state that Sıddık Aycıl held multiple positions within the municipality, including in the zoning and urbanisation, building control, inspection board and culture and social affairs directorates. Additionally, he also served as the private secretary to the mayor, Hüseyin Beyoğlu, a position to which he was appointed following the election of Beyoğlu as Mayor.

The investigation suggests the existence of a network of corruption within the municipality, implicating high-ranking officials and shedding light on systemic corruption issues in Turkiye. Cases like this may further erode public trust in government institutions and they emphasise the need for accountability and transparency in the local governance.