Mehmet Müezzinoğlu

Mehmet Müezzinoğlu (born January 9, 1955) is a Turkish physician and politician, who served as the Minister of Labour and Social Security between 2016 and 2017, and the Minister of Health from 2013 to 2016.

Early years He was born on January 9, 1955, in Arriana village of Rhodope to Ali and his wife Fatma, a family from the Turkish minority in Greece. Müezzinoğlu went to Istanbul for his high school education. He studied in an İmam Hatip school, where he met Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who was his classmate.

In 1983, Müezzinoğlu immigrated from Greece illegally by crossing the river Maritsa . Before acquiring Turkish citizenship in 1986, he lived in Turkey as a heimatlos between 1983 and 1986.

Politics Müezzinoğlu became a member of the Islamist Welfare Party (, RP) in 1992, where he helped to make policy alongside Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Between 2002 and 2007, he served as the chairman of the Justice and Development Party's Istanbul Province organization. He kept his post in three successive cabinets of Ahmet Davutoğlu. On 24 May 2016, the Third Davutoğlu Cabinet was dissolved, and Müezzinoğlu's term as Health Minister ended. On 31 August 2016, he was appointed Minister of Labour and Social Security in the Cabinet of Yıldırım replacing Süleyman Soylu. During a cabinet reshuffle on 19 July 2017, his term ended, and he was succeeded by Jülide Sarıeroğlu.

Family life Mehmet Müezzinoğlu is married and has two children.