President Soyer: 'Izmir is not Enemy Land'

The 2023 budget of the Izmir Metropolitan Municipality was accepted as 25 billion 900 million TL. Mayor of the Metropolitan Municipality speaking at the council meeting Tunç Soyer“It is of course proud that our investment budget is over 40 percent in this period when the economic conditions are getting worse and many public institutions can hardly reach the financing to provide their minimum services,” he said.

Mayor Soyer also explained the blocked projects and services of Izmir Metropolitan Municipality one by one. Stating that the damage caused by the obstructions caused by the ministries and bureaucracy should be asked by the judiciary, Soyer said: The political establishment is nothing like that. You cannot do politics against the citizens. Please remember this. Izmir is not enemy territory. These things cannot be seen in Izmir," he said.

The eighth meeting of the Izmir Metropolitan Municipality's ordinary assembly meeting in November, President Tunç Soyer organized under his administration. In the session, the budget and performance program of the Izmir Metropolitan Municipality for 2023 and the following years were discussed. After the voting, the 2023 budget of the Izmir Metropolitan Municipality was determined as 25 billion 900 million TL. The budget was accepted by the majority of votes, despite the approval of the Republican People's Party (CHP) and the IYI Party, and the rejection of the AK Party and the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP).
Mayor of Izmir Metropolitan Municipality Tunç SoyerFor the 2023 budget, he said, “It is of course proud that our investment budget is over 40 percent in this period when the economic conditions are getting worse and many public institutions can hardly reach the financing to provide their minimum services.”

He explained what was done under the headings

Giving examples of the works carried out under the headings, Mayor Soyer said, “Our total budget for urban infrastructure in 2023 is approximately 4 billion 800 million TL. That is 27 percent of our total budget. Despite the increase in diesel and asphalt prices by more than one hundred percent, we implemented a total of 2020 million 1 thousand tons of asphalt, including 700 million 2021 thousand tons in 954, 2022 thousand tons in 674, and 4 thousand tons in 600. For the next year, we are making 1,5 million tons of asphalt application, 1 million 900 thousand square meters of land road pavement and 1 million 200 thousand square meters of parquet coating for raw roads. We allocated a budget of 2023 billion 1 million TL in 800 for these works. One of the focal points of our work is undoubtedly to build a city that is resistant to natural disasters. In the last two years, we have allocated approximately 34 million liras from the Metropolitan's budget for scientific studies on the buildings in our city. We signed a protocol with the Izmir Branch of the Chamber of Civil Engineers (IMO) in order to take the inventory of the building stock in our city, which is especially an earthquake zone. The most affected by the October 30 Earthquake BayraklıWith the work we carried out in , we made a building inventory of 33 thousand 100 houses. We are starting the second phase work for 60 thousand houses. One of the main pillars of our infrastructure strategic goal is, of course, urban transformation. Unfortunately, İzmir has been the victim of unplanned construction for more than fifty years. The city, which grew with zoning amnesties without considering the transportation infrastructure, has turned into a giant concrete pile. Neighborhoods devoid of green and social spaces are knotted together. Now we untie this knot with patience and care. With the principle of on-site transformation based on one hundred percent consensus, we started the biggest urban transformation move in the history of İzmir in 2021. Transformation started at the same time and continues in six regions, namely Gaziemir, Ege Mahallesi, Uzundere, Ballıkuyu, Çiğli Güzeltepe and Örnekköy. We are making our biggest investment in 2023 with 6 billion 1 million TL under our "Quality of Life" goal. That's about a third of our budget. The most important topic of our strategic goal of quality of life is undoubtedly rail systems. A total of 93 billion liras will be spent on our six rail system project, which is under construction in Izmir and has a length of 32 kilometers. When we complete these projects, our rail system network in İzmir will increase to 270 kilometers. In 2023, we allocated a total budget of 3 billion 374 million TL for our rail system investments. In the centennial year of our Republic, we are opening both the Narlıdere Metro and the Çiğli Tramway. The main problem of our country is the collapse of the economy and poverty. For this reason, our economic strategic goal has a very important meaning in this period we are going through. We allocated a budget of 2023 million in 803 to the field of economy. In addition, many of our municipal companies, especially İZFAŞ, İZTARIM and İZDOĞA, operate in this field. In the last five years, none of the 3 law proposals submitted by the opposition parties in the Grand National Assembly of Turkey were enacted. None of the parliamentary research proposals submitted by the opposition were accepted by the government. The Izmir Metropolitan Municipality Council, on the other hand, is governed by a very different spirit and understanding. If the motions from the opposition are for the benefit of İzmir, they are immediately processed. We don't like to undermine an idea that is right for our city and our country just because it came from the opposition. In 845, we are taking firm steps towards making İzmir a resilient city in harmony with its nature. The amount we have allocated for this strategic goal is 2023 million 737 thousand liras, that is, we have allocated 176 of our budget for our nature. We think that human resources are very important for İzmir to realize our universal goals. Our strategic goal of “learning by living” is to design and develop the entire city as a learning space. We allocated 4.2 billion 2023 million liras, ie almost 2 percent of our budget, from our 54 budget for this strategic goal, which also includes institutional capacity. The 12 budget of our culture and arts strategic goal is 2023 million liras. The ratio of this to the total budget is about four percent," he said.

“I have been working for Izmir with love for more than 3 and a half years”

Saying, “I have been working for İzmir with love for more than three and a half years since the day I received my mandate, Mayor Soyer said, “Our city, country and the world have passed many difficult tests since then. It continues to pass. We are working to be an exemplary metropolis where approximately 4,5 million people live in harmony with each other and with its nature. Izmir is not a matter of fight for us. Izmir is a solution square. It is a city where we stand together against difficulties and thus serve the citizens. We see the positive results of this basic principle for İzmir every day and we will continue to see it. In our election campaign, we made a long-term recipe for İzmir. Our main goal is to increase the welfare of İzmir and to ensure the fair share of this welfare. We did not deviate from this goal for a single day, and we laid out the roadmap for how to achieve it in our 2019-2020 strategic plan, which was passed unanimously by our parliament in September 2024. I can proudly say that for the first time in Turkey, we have a strategic plan that fully covers the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. This plan consists of 7 strategic goals and 27 goals in line with the United Nations' sustainable development goals. Our strategy guides us to increase prosperity in our city and ensure its fair distribution despite the deepening poverty and pessimism. All of our efforts have one more main goal: to rebuild the trust of the youth of Turkey in their country.”

Announced the blocked projects one by one

Mayor of Izmir Metropolitan Municipality Tunç Soyer He also explained one by one the obstacles that ministries and government-affiliated institutions have placed on project, loan and allocation requests. Soyer, who asked for the damages caused due to the unacknowledged approvals and pending signatures to be examined and the responsible ones to be held accountable, said:
“I invite the prosecutors and judges of the republic, which has left its centennial behind, to duty. We never accept that many of our actions, which are the right of the people of Izmir, are interrupted. Because every signature that you do not sign or keep waiting creates either a public loss or harm to the public. Or it causes both. Frankly, we have come to a point where the service can be used as a tool for politics, I have difficulty in understanding this. The political institution is nothing like that. You cannot do politics against the citizens. Please remember this. Izmir is not enemy territory. These cannot be seen in Izmir. İzmir is one of the 81 provinces of this country. It is an integral part. Izmir's pending affairs in Ankara bind not only me as the mayor of this city, but also all our council members who come to this hall with the votes of the people of Izmir, regardless of their party.

Obstructions causing public harm;

• We applied to the Ministry of Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change with the aim of creating a financing source for the 100 electric buses that ESHOT General Directorate plans to add to its fleet and requested approval for the 421 million TL loan to be covered by domestic borrowing. In the past seven months, we have not received a positive or negative response from the ministry.
• The request for the transfer of the piers used in maritime transportation to the municipality has not been answered by the Privatization Administration for 8 years.
• The zoning plan, which was designed to use a part of the Fisherman's Shelter next to the Bostanlı Ferry Port to solve the mooring problem of the ships carrying passengers in the Gulf, could not be implemented because the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure and the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry did not give approval. The request for the allocation of Bostanlı Fisherman's Shelter, which was planned to be used as a shelter for ships, to the municipality was first approved by the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure, and then rejected.
• The request for the renewal of the rental agreement of Yassıcaada, where our citizens can spend their daily vacations economically during the summer period, was not approved by the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry and the Yassıcaada facilities were rendered idle.
• Bayraklı Although the study project prepared for the City Hospital cable car line was tendered and the project process started, the request for the right to use the upper station area planned to be built in the hospital area by the Metropolitan Municipality could not be answered.
• The application made for the allocation of the construction site to be established in the Islamsaray District of Bergama in the north of the city in order to carry out the municipal services in a healthy way has been waiting for an answer from the Ministry of Environment and Urbanization for 3 years.
• Grand Plaza A.Ş. has awarded the tender for the privatization of the immovable on which the Historical Electricity Factory is located in the area behind the harbor. Although it won, the tender was cancelled. It was not renewed. This unique cultural heritage of Izmir is decaying day by day before the eyes of 4.5 million people of Izmir. If this isn't public harm, what is? I am calling out to the bureaucrats who did not go to the tender again. Don't see this as an excuse for Izmir. We said we are. Don't let that building rot. It is a legacy of this city.
• Following the 30 October Izmir earthquake, with the decision of the Izmir Governor's Office, the facility to be established in Kemalpasa Sütçüler Neighborhood to recycle the debris from the buildings and bring them into the economy was not approved.
• We went out to tender for the revision of the Çiğli Wastewater Treatment Plant so that the external financing would be found by the tenderer. In this context, a permission letter was written in February for the use of external financing for the project. However, when the Treasury approval did not come, İZSU had to make this investment with equity.
• Çiğli Wastewater Treatment Plant IV. Phase II. We went out to tender for the supply construction in a way that the foreign financing company would find the tender again. Here, too, approval for the use of external financing has not been given since February.

Circumstances that directly harm the public:

• Our project, which will provide a solution to the transportation problem of the surrounding districts, was not granted a visa. In order to include private transportation cooperatives in the city's transportation network, and to enable citizens to benefit from discounted transportation through electronic boarding cards instead of cash payment, the aim of disseminating the İZTAŞIT Project, which was launched in Seferihisar in 2019, was stuck in the legislation "the obligation to provide public transportation service to be obtained from private institutions through tender". Our request for this service to be obtained from more than one cooperative with the protocols to be made was not accepted by the Ministry of Environment and Urbanization.
• The second obstacle in this regard was accomplished by interfering with the functioning of UKOME. The structure of the Transportation Coordination Directorate (UKOME), which provides planning and coordination by making decisions regarding transportation and traffic in the areas within the scope of duty, authority and responsibility of metropolitan municipalities, has been changed.
• Among the obstacles we encounter in the field of urban transformation is that the loan approval, which unfortunately hurt all of us, and which will relieve the victims of the earthquake, came after waiting for almost two years. But the decision that came is much worse than this long waiting period. A large part of the international low-interest housing loan we obtained as a result of great effort for the earthquake survivors of Izmir was shifted to other provinces of Turkey, not Izmir.
• Our proposal regarding the removal of the treasury surplus in the title deeds of the entitled citizens in the urban transformation area in Gaziemir district, Aktepe and Emrez neighborhoods was left unanswered by the Ministry.
• I have to say with regret and embarrassment that even the request for land allocation for the cemetery of the Izmir Metropolitan Municipality has been held for 5 years.

Obstructions that both harm the public and cause harm to the public

• The Güney-6 Integrated Solid Waste Management Facility, which will be built in Menderes in order to recycle the domestic solid wastes of 2 districts in the south of the city and to generate electricity from the wastes, has not been approved for 2 years.
• The municipality has not been allocated for 3 years for the construction site that will pave the way for the services to be provided in the north of the city.
• Although all institution approvals have been obtained for the Seferihisar construction site, the Provincial Directorate of Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change does not allow allocation.
• Our application for the Mavişehir Extension Line within the scope of the Çiğli Tramway was left unsolved.

Obstacles cannot deter us

CHP Group Deputy Chairman Murat Aydın said, “About two thirds of all public investments in İzmir are made by municipalities. In the last ten years, the amount of direct investment made in İzmir from the central government budget is quite low.” Stating that obstacles are put in front of the production of services by the central government, Aydın said, "Whatever they do, no matter what illegal method or which law-abiding public official they put on us, Izmir Metropolitan Municipality, elected by the votes of the people of Izmir, aims to serve the people of Izmir with its president, council, bureaucrats and all its employees. Live for it, start working, it will continue to work. No obstruction will change our attitude. Our dreams, our ideals are too big to fit into 1-year budgets. As long as there is the support of the people of Izmir, no obstacles put in front of us, no pressure created will be able to prevent us from our path. Wherever we are, no matter what we do, we will endure any hardship.”

“It is necessary to surrender the rights of Izmir Metropolitan Municipality”

Emphasizing that Izmir Metropolitan Municipality produces services in every field in a social democratic line, CHP Group SözcüSü Nilay Kökkılınç said, “The shares from the central administration are not a blessing. İzmir is the third city that earns the most taxes in its country, but it ranks last in public investments. Since taking office in 2019, Izmir Metropolitan Municipality has faced major disasters such as earthquakes, pandemics, and floods. Here, too, İzmir is a city that has received appreciation and thanks even from our ministries in terms of resistant cities with extraordinary efforts. This should also be underlined. It is necessary to give the right to the Izmir Metropolitan Municipality regarding women's work. Studies and services have also been produced with participatory democracy.”

“We wish the 2023 budget to be beneficial for our Izmir”

Indicating that Izmir Metropolitan Municipality is acting within the framework of the strategic plan, IYI Party Group Deputy Chairman Kemal Sevinç said, “The epidemic, which has affected the whole world, has been continuing its effect in our country for more than 2 years. The loss of life and property as a result of the earthquake that occurred in our city was a separate source of sadness. Our municipality has done the necessary work in both cases and continues to do so. In the face of these events, there may be some delays and delays in the target projects. We hope that the 2023 budget will be beneficial for our İzmir.”

Karşıyaka Thanks to President Soyer from President Tugay for the stadium process

in session Karşıyaka Making a statement about the stadium Karşıyaka Mayor Cemil summarized the process and thanked Izmir Metropolitan Municipality Mayor Soyer for his support. President Tugay said, “We have explained this issue maybe a hundred times so far. My councilor friend says I'm embarrassed. I am not ashamed, but I am ashamed that the same lie is told persistently. 'Cause with a phrase that's not really true Karşıyaka trying to deceive the people. I have shared information and documents about it many times. After that, I will share it with anyone who wants it. You have been following the process very closely from the very beginning. In the presence of everyone, the people of Izmir, but especially KarşıyakaI have a thank you that I want people to hear. We went to the Minister of Youth and Sports together with the club president. 'There is no longer any obstacle to the construction of the stadium. This stadium has not been built until today because there are always obstacles to the construction of this place. But as of now, there is no obstacle. Are you going to build the stadium?' we said. Minister, 'We cannot allocate resources here. That's why we can't build the stadium," he said. Having said that, we came to you with the club president. 'Sir, will the Izmir Metropolitan Municipality help in the construction of this place or will it do it?' When we said that, you said 'of course we will, this is a problem that needs to be solved' and I have been a witness since that day. Karşıyaka I want your people to know. You have always been sincere and honest. You were always in the same spot. And you have always taken a constructive attitude towards solving this problem. for him Karşıyaka As mayor, I sincerely thank you. The subject is this; This is just an area where unlicensed, unprojected concrete was thrown during the 2014 elections so that we can hastily demolish it and rebuild the stadium. There is no implementation project. There is a tender made without an implementation project. It's unclear what happened. A building registration certificate was obtained for the unlicensed concrete. Because of this building registration certificate, the architect, who did not make an application project related to this place, only made a preliminary project in form, gained the right to be an author. He has to give up this right of authorship, because he has no work related to the stat, that is, there is no implementation project. It just stuck here. We can't go any further. If he doesn't give up his ownership, we have no chance to take over the place, have the project done, or make a tender here. They know this very well. In a way I don't understand, a district mayor goes and makes a show, the head of the province makes a statement, and from time to time, the council members make statements as soon as they come, and they try to deceive people. This is shameful. We should not do this as if you are mocking 350 thousand people in this way. I beg them. Simply a certificate of success will come from the architect. Because the architect has no right to ask for money, he has no labor. They'll see what happens after that. I have repeatedly and specifically requested that this process be kept completely out of politics. Because many people with different political views KarşıyakaAs a common opinion, he wants a stadium to be built here. That's why I said please don't make it a subject of abuse. Here I repeat this call again. The address for the solution is the ministry. Please let them go to the minister, a certificate of success will come from the architect. There are articles written by both us and you last April. No answer was given. Let this incident cease to be a meaningless discussion anymore.”

Ödemiş Mayor Mehmet Eriş, who explained the services carried out by İzmir Metropolitan Municipality in his district, said, “Mr. Mayor, thank you for your support. Good luck with our budget," he said.