Bilal Erdoğan, a son of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, said he had never engaged in maritime transport while responding to questions about his business activities, but corporate records show that he currently serves as a board member of the family-owned shipping company BMZ Group.
Speaking at a public event organized by the Güngören Municipality, Erdoğan insisted that he had never personally been involved in shipping, a statement that renewed scrutiny of the family’s long-controversial maritime business.
Bilal Erdoğan is a partner in the BMZ Group together with President Erdoğan’s brother Mustafa Erdoğan and brother-in-law Ziya İlgen. The family-owned company operates in shipping and construction and has long attracted scrutiny over its maritime activities.
Asked what business he is involved in and how he makes money, Bilal Erdoğan said he has been operating in the food sector for more than a decade, describing restaurant ventures in Turkey and recent expansions abroad.
He said his first commercial activities began around 2007 after returning from the United States, initially partnering with friends in cosmetics retail before moving into the restaurant business in early 2009. He added that those activities continue today, noting that a restaurant was opened in Dubai around a year and a half ago and that a new location is planned in Baku.
“I am in the food sector,” Erdoğan said, referring to restaurant investments with business partners.
Erdoğan family’s shipping business back in focus over Israel trade
Bilal Erdoğan also said, in response to a question about trade with Israel, “I never engaged in shipping. My brother did. After that, he sold the ship and exited the business,” referring to his brother, Burak Erdoğan.
However, a report by the Gazete Pencere news website revealed that Bilal Erdoğan’s name appears in the most recent corporate documents of BMZ Group, contradicting his public denial. The report said that minutes from a board meeting held two months ago list Bilal Erdoğan as a member of the company’s board of directors, with a mandate extending until 2028.
The question comes amid continued criticism over Turkey’s trade relations with Israel, which continued for months after Israel launched its military campaign in Gaza following the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack.
According to trade figures published earlier this month by Al Jazeera, Turkey was among Israel’s largest trading partners between 2019 and 2023, accounting for 4.8 percent of Israel’s total trade during that period, valued at $35.7 billion. Only the United States, China and Germany ranked ahead of Turkey.
The scale of those commercial ties has sparked criticism both domestically and internationally, particularly as President Erdoğan positioned himself as one of Israel’s most vocal critics over Gaza.
Turkey announced restrictions on exports to Israel in April 2024 and later said all trade had been halted. However, trade trackers and media reports have described how shipments continued through indirect routes and intermediaries.
A United Nations report published in October said Turkey was among the countries that enabled Israel’s actions in Gaza, citing trade data that showed continued oil shipments and trans-shipments from Turkish ports to Israel despite Ankara’s official trade suspension.
Gaza remains in crisis following Israel’s military campaign, with local health authorities reporting more than 71,000 deaths. A ceasefire that took effect on October 10 has failed to halt Israeli strikes.
Bilal Erdoğan remarks quickly drew attention on social media, where users questioned his omission of the maritime sector and asked what had happened to the family’s much-discussed fleet of cargo ships.
The Erdoğan family’s shipping businesses have been criticized since the early years of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government, when opposition figures and commentators questioned the ethics of close relatives of the prime minister operating in the lucrative cargo transport sector.
At the time, then-prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan publicly defended the shipping activities of his other son, Burak Erdoğan, referring to his vessels as “gemicik” (“shiplings”) in an effort to downplay their scale and commercial significance.
In a 2007 interview Erdoğan said cargo ships could be purchased with relatively small down payments and that such vessels could cover their own costs through operations, arguing that there was nothing improper about the business.
Bilal Erdoğan’s decision not to mention shipping during his remarks comes as his public profile continues to attract scrutiny amid speculation about the post-Erdoğan political era.
Although he holds no elected office and is not a member of the cabinet, observers note a visible shift in how his public appearances and statements are covered, with more frequent headlines, video clips and commentary treating him as a political actor rather than solely as the president’s son.
Supporters describe this as a natural outcome of his civil society work, while critics argue it reflects an effort to normalize the idea of passing power to Erdoğan’s son following the end of Erdoğan’s tenure in 2028.
A December survey by Refleks Data and Research showed Bilal Erdoğan ranking third in hypothetical succession scenarios within the AKP, well behind Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan and former interior minister Süleyman Soylu.