Main opposition vice chair Böke receives death threat live on TV

Main opposition vice chair Böke receives death threat live on TV

Aysel Alp - ANKARA
Main opposition vice chair Böke receives death threat live on TV

DHA photo

Main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) vice chair and spokesperson Selin Sayek Böke has received a death threat after appearing on a television program on Feb. 21. 

A suspect reportedly called CNNTürk, while Böke was on a live TV program presented by journalist Şirin Payzın, threatening her that she would not be able to get home alive and would be killed after she leaves the studios. 

The channel’s administration informed the police immediately after the call, while they also informed Böke about it and added that police would be waiting for her at the end of the program.

Böke was reportedly escorted to the airport with tightened security measures to travel to her home in the capital Ankara.

Heavily armored police officers waited for Böke at the entrance of the plane. Meanwhile, an eight-vehicle convoy including anti-terrorism and traffic police teams accompanied Böke’s vehicle. 

CHP group deputy chairman Özgür Özel and CHP lawmaker Aykut Erdoğdu greeted Böke at the airport. She arrived at her home at 3:00 a.m. on Feb. 21 after security forces ensured the entire building of her apartment was safe. They accompanied her while she left her car, only after they permitted, and as she entered her flat. 

Earlier, Böke had answered questions in a Central Executive Board meeting about death threats journalists were receiving, saying, “I was not brought up in the woods to be scared by owls.”

“If we did not fear for our children’s future, we would not be in politics. If we want to build a Turkey where our children do not live in fear, we should jointly struggle without fear. These threats cannot defeat us,” she said.  

Böke also said her grandmother was not aware of the incident, adding that she wanted her grandmother to know that she was safe.  

Previously, she had said on a TV program that as the naysayer campaigners, they were facing harsh difficulties. 

“Saying ‘no’ means facing death threats in this country,” she said.