Medical Doctor, Professor. Alleged of being terrorist. Imprisoned 14 months. Travel banned.

My name is Zekeriya Aktürk.

https://twitter.com/zekeriyaakturk
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtyi...

I studied. I was supported to study. I became a medical doctor. I am a graduate of Marmara University. I could have described myself as “Homeland lover.” I worked in the east and west of Turkey. I was in Kocaeli in the 1999 earthquake. Even though I was assigned to Edirne as a lecturer, I decided to stay there for a month and serve, help people. In particular, I was an interpreter for foreigners who came to the Health Directorate. I started academic life in Edirne in October. I worked there for seven years. In general, I can say that my life is full of successes.

I am one of the top 10 professors in the field of family medicine in Turkey. My mother tongue is Turkish. I also know English, German, Arabic fluently.

I worked for four years in Saudi Arabia as a consultant to the Saudi Ministry of Health. I worked as an expert. In 2009, we decided to return to Turkey. Again, homeland love. This time, my wife really missed the country. We came and settled in Erzurum. I worked at Atatürk University.

I think I've made a significant contribution to that university, too. For example, we built an automation program called “Mevlana World Network.” It's an automation that I think has significant contributions to be international. Later, we started giving regular courses to Kazakh students. We organized “research methods” courses for them. I was the dean of the School of Pharmacy. For a period, we had activities related to curriculum development and training programs. I presided over the Department of Family Medicine, and Bio Statistics. I've trained a lot of medical students, assistants, associate teachers. I organized Student Scientific Research Congresses. I did three of them in Erzurum. I suggest you look at their booklets. Has it been done again since then? Is it made before? Please check. My number of articles, congressional papers and books is around 400. I have a YouTube channel with about 500 tutorials. I suggest you take a look at the YouTube channel.

I do not know whether any other professor in Turkey has offered so much educational material in this field. I'm a member of many international associations. These include, in particular, the European First Order Family Medicine and the First Order Quality Association. I'm a founding member of EQuiP. I worked for this association for about 20 years. I was a treasurer. I went to all their meetings. I invited them to Turkey and guested them.

Long story short, 2015 has arrived. We decided to settle in Izmir. We moved to Izmir as family. We decided to lead a lifestyle that is our dream. At that time, there was Şifa University in Izmir. It was a successful university. Everything was going well. We were happy with life, too. But everyone has a plan, and Allah has a plan. He had things he wanted to do. Things didn't go as we expected. There was a coup attempt. The university was shut down, I've been out of a job.
While looking for jobs abroad, I signed a contract in Medina. I made a deal under the Saudi Ministry of Health. I was going to work in Medina on $15,000 a month's salary.
But on the way out, I was detained at the airport. I was arrested on September 2, 2016. I was imprisoned for 14 months and a week. I'd like to tell you about the prison life, what I went through there. It was a terrible, devastating blow to me, I can't describe it. I wanted to die. I tell you this, maybe you'll understand. I couldn't believe it at first. I said, “They're joking. So they arrest me?"
The fact is that the real blow was made to the people of Anatolia. Unfortunately, the religious people have also been applauded for it. At least they ignored it. That's what I think. I think I was sacrificed for the sake of simple interests like home, car, road, salary. People like me and myself, hundreds of thousands of people who grew up in difficult conditions, have been wasted in this period.

Now I've half-freedom for two years. When you say half-freedom, you know, I can't go abroad, no job. I can't work anywhere else. I'm waiting for them to give me my passport. If they let me live free the rest of my life, I'll go to another country and live there for the rest of my life. Let me not cause any more trouble to the great Turkish nation, let me walk away.

In the meantime, I've been tagged by some of my relatives. My friends didn't call me. They stopped following me on social media! I've been removed from the scientific boards of magazines. My name has been erased from the board of association administrations. The Expert Association has not published my book, which is ready to print 2 volumes - a thousand pages, with the contribution of over 60 professors.

My life turned upside down because of what I've been through in the last few years. Who knows, maybe underground is better than upside. I don't know. Let's wait and see. Never lose the hope.