Turks need to know .. where is the $128 bl

Missing reserves of $128 billion from Turkey’s Central Bank has triggered a publicity campaign from the opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) demanding to know the money’s whereabouts and police action to stop the question from being asked.

Now the CHP is asking, why the Central Bank reserves are now empty and who bought the Central Bank reserves at what rate; Who profited from this? The question gained traction among the Turkish public. It became daily small talk and neighborhood chit chat.

The question has also trended on social media and posters on billboards around Istanbul, while the ruling Justice and Development party AKP on Tuesday blocked a CHP call to debate the missing funds in parliament.

Police took the posters down, using cranes in some instances, according to videos shared online by the opposition Republican People's Party (CHP), which said it would keep putting them back up.

The Republican People’s Party (CHP) said $128 billion of foreign reserves were used during former Finance Minister Berak Albayrak’s tenure to stabilize the Turkish lira, which has been plummeting in value, and that it was a party’s constitutional right to probe where the country’s reserves were being spent.

The unorthodox policy began around the 2019 municipal elections and was ramped up in 2020, when the pandemic laid bare the lira's vulnerability and Turkey's reliance on external funding.

"(Erdogan) says 'you cannot even ask me questions'," CHP leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu told party members, accusing the AKP of stifling debate. "Those leading the country must give an account to the people."

Kilicdaroglu said a prosecutor had ruled that some posters that bore a silhouette of the presidential palace were an insult to Erdogan. Insulting the president is a crime in Turkey.