Ankaragucu in turmoil as court rules against Gokceks

Massive confusion in Ankaragucu circles today as a court in Ankara effectively cancelled the elections that brought Ahmet Gokcek to power.

The court deemed that the Emergency General Meeting held on August 30, 2009, where Gokcek Jr. was elected, and the Annual General Meeting held on January 3 this year were both null and void due to the fact that the election was rigged. Well... the judge didn't actually say that but the decision was based on an expert report which said that 400 people who shouldn't have voted, did. Which is sort of like rigging, isn't it?

The expert report then points out that if those 400 people were not counted, quorum would not have been reached and therefore the two meetings must be declared as not being legal.

Ankara Mayor Melih Gokcek is just slightly pissed off. "What a pity, looks like Ankaragucu are going down this season, that's the way things look," Gokcek told journalists after a meeting of the Third Ankara Tourism and Promotion Council. I'm amazed they got to the third.

"I think we can say there are two problems here," Gokcek continued and then went on to name them in case the journalists thought he was referring to himself and Gokcek Jr.. "(Former Ankaragucu chairman) Cemal Aydin opened the first case and (former board member) Cengiz Topel the the second."

So what the hell does it all mean? Buggered if I know but that hasn't stopped me speculating in the past. My conspiracy theory is that the Gokcek's knew they were buggered when the cases where first opened. I'm sure that they have now enrolled enough supporters to win any election for control but the general meeting must be re-held with only those eligible to vote on the dates of the now null and void earlier meetings. Is that why they still haven't bothered to pay so many players salary for quite a few months now? I don't know, but it has a nice ring to it, and this is the land where "Conspiracy Theory 101" is a compulsory high school subject.

In a turn of events that comes as no surprise at all, reports on various newspaper websites say the future is not certain. The court seems to have not appointed a caretaker management and therefore the Gokcek's will continue for the moment anyway but a new AGM must be held very quickly.

Or else the Gokcek's could appeal, a process that would take at least a year. A court could appoint a caretaker management but the Gokcek's could point to the precedent of Bursaspor where the old management continued in a similar situation (don't ask me about the Bursa case because I know absolutely nothing about it).

Just to complicate things Cemal Aydin still has a court case going against the club saying they owe him a lot of money. How this fits in with all this I have no idea.

Oh and then there is the small matter of the 13 Turkish players who haven't been paid for ages. According to a report by DHA, they are owed 1.7 trillion (the report doesn't say which currency but we can guess it is the one that hasn't existed in Turkey for six years now). If they aren't paid by Christmas they will all be free agents.

As of this afternoon, there was nothing about the case on the Ankaragucu website.

Writing this post has done my head in. I'm off to lay down for a while.

UPDATE

Ankaragucu press spokesman Avni Kavlak has said they will wait until the court's reasonings are published before deciding whether to appeal or whether to walk away. I am so not looking forward to having to translate a Turkish court's reasonings. The only thing worse is having to understand and translate a journalist's report on a court reasoning.

Update 2 (Wednesday evening)

Gokcek Jr. has now made a statement.

"You'll see. On Monday 98 percent of our players will either be free agents or will leave the club. Coach Umit Ozat today told me, 'My chairman, I will certainly not continue my work without you or our managing board'. In other words, our coach is leaving," Gokcek Jr was quoted as saying by the Anatolia news agency.

Apart from the shock value, I love the mathematics of it. Just how many players must Ankaragucu have in order to make the precise figure of 98 percent true. The answer - 49. Quite a big squad.

Gokcek Jr. said that they had come to a decision today not to continue but that this was not a final decision because various people are away at the moment.

The report ends with what Spine describes as a scorched earth statement. Commenting on the need for TL 14 million for the players, Gokcek basically said that he won't be asking for this money from any of the directors (which is basically how the club finances itself). "The reason for this is that they have said they will not invest in a club that is not run by our Honourary Chairman Mr. Melih Gokcek under my chairmanship."

It all sounds like propaganda to me, but lets see if on Monday the 2 percent of players left at the club are enough to form a team. By my calculation, if the 2 percent is 11 players, then the club must have 550-odd players on its books. No wonder they need more money.