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Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan signed a decree on Thursday to close Istanbul Bilgi University, one of the country’s oldest private universities, eight months after its owner was seized by the state in a criminal investigation into alleged fraud and money laundering.
As grounds for the move, the decree, published in the Official Gazette, cites a law allowing for the closure of a private institution if “the expected level of education and training … is insufficient”.
The decision also said the licence had been revoked because “the founding foundation has been placed under trusteeship.” The university’s management has not commented.
The Küçükçekmece Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office launched its investigation into Can Holding in September 2025, alleging that the group’s principals had established a criminal organisation and engaged in money laundering and tax evasion.
Detention orders were issued for 10 people, including principals Mehmet Şakir Can, Kemal Can and Kenan Tekdağ.
As part of the operation, 121 Can Holding companies were seized and placed under the management of the Savings Deposit Insurance Fund (TMSF). Among those seized were the television channels Habertürk and Show TV, the financial news channel Bloomberg HT, the Doğa school network, and Istanbul Bilgi University.
Investigators said at the time they had discovered that “large amounts of money of unknown origin were entered via companies operating under Can Holding,” which were transferred between companies to conceal the origin. Forged documents were also allegedly used to reduce tax liability, they said in a statement.
The three media outlets had been acquired by Can Holding in December 2024.
Prosecutors added that some of Can Holding’s activities were “directly financed with criminal revenues.”
The TMSF was established in 1983 as a banking deposit insurance body but its mandate was significantly expanded by government decrees following the 2016 coup attempt and further broadened by legislative amendments that came into force in January 2025. It currently controls more than 1,000 companies.
Critics and press freedom organisations have argued that the fund has become an instrument of political pressure against independent and opposition-linked businesses.
Following the trustee appointment, Council of Higher Education President Erol Özvar had told the public that teaching at Bilgi University would continue without interruption. It has not.
Under Turkish higher education regulations, students at a closed-foundation university are automatically transferred to a designated “guarantor” state institution.
Bilgi University had previously told T24 that Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University had served in that role since 2021. If it cannot accommodate all students, the Council of Higher Education will designate a third university to absorb the remaining students.
The fate of academic staff has not been addressed in any official statement.
Founded on 7 June 1996 as Turkey’s fourth private foundation university, Bilgi became part of the Laureate International Universities network, a US-based group operating universities across multiple continents, in 2006. Can Holding acquired it in 2019 for $90 million.
Bilgi, which participates in the EU’s Erasmus exchange programme, has more than 20,000 students from both Turkey and abroad, and some of its researchers are renowned in their fields.
