Muhsin Yazıcıoğlu

Muhsin Yazıcıoğlu (December 31, 1954 – March 25, 2009) was a Turkish politician and member of the Parliament of Turkey. He was the leader and founder of the Great Unity Party (BBP), a right-wing nationalist-Islamist political party.

Biography Yazıcıoğlu was born 1954 in a small village named Elmalı in Şarkışla of Sivas Province. He studied in Şarkışla from primary school to high school after that he was educated at the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine in Ankara University. He was a member of the ultranationalist Grey Wolves. After the 1980 Turkish coup d'état, Yazıcıoğlu was arrested for being one of the leaders of Grey Wolves. He stayed for seven years in prison until his release in 1987. In the following years, Yazıcıoğlu was involved in politics as a member of the far-right Nationalist Movement Party. In 1991, he and some of his fellows left this movement and established a new political party called Great Unity Party with a more Islamist ideology.

His party has been represented in the Parliament only via electoral coalitions with popular parties. At the 2002 legislative elections, the party won 1.1% of the popular vote and no seats; in the 2007 elections Muhsin Yazıcıoğlu was elected as an independent.

Death

Yazıcıoğlu died on March 25, 2009, in a suspicious helicopter crash Güneş made several calls to emergency services, but the helicopter wreck was not found in time. Later, the officials involved were investigated and charged with several crimes including negligence of duty , with the lack of/delayed response being blamed on the Gülen movement having infiltrated government institutions.

Yazıcıoğlu received a state funeral to which most of the party leaders attended. Thousands of people joined his funeral ceremony in Kocatepe Mosque in Ankara. After his death, in the 2009 local elections the BBP's candidate was elected as the new mayor of Sivas.