A court on Saturday arrested the mayor of Bursa, Turkey’s fourth-largest city, days after he was detained with dozens of others in a corruption investigation that the main opposition says is part of an ongoing government crackdown on its municipalities.
Mayor Mustafa Bozbey, from the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), had been taken into custody on March 31 in a probe led by the Bursa Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office. Prosecutors accuse him of crimes including bribery, money laundering, forming and leading a criminal organization and abuses tied to zoning and construction permits in Bursa’s Nilüfer district.
Turkish media reports on Saturday said Bozbey was jailed after lengthy questioning, while some of his family members who were among the detainees, including his wife and daughter, were released under judicial supervision.
The prosecutor’s office had earlier said the operation targeted 59 suspects across several provinces, with 55 detained in coordinated raids. Turkey’s state-run Anadolu news agency reported on Friday that 57 suspects, including Bozbey, had been referred to court after their prosecutorial questioning was completed.
The investigation focuses on alleged irregularities in construction projects and claims that increased building rights were granted in return for bribes, allowing developers to earn illicit profits. Former Nilüfer mayor Turgay Erdem had already been jailed in October 2025 in a related case.
The CHP says the case is part of a broader pressure campaign against opposition-held municipalities following the party’s strong showing in the March 2024 local elections, when it won many of Turkey’s largest cities and dealt President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) a major setback. Critics point to a series of cases against CHP mayors, including İstanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, as evidence of a broader crackdown on elected opposition officials.
A statement from municipal workers union Tüm Bel Sen this week said that 85 municipalities have changed hands since the March 2024 local elections, through trustee appointments, removals, arrests and shifts in city council control, affecting 8.8 million votes, or 20.5 percent of all ballots cast nationwide.