Turkey revokes Istanbul Bilgi University licence, forcing closure after takeover

Turkey has moved from seizure to closure at Istanbul Bilgi University, revoking the school’s operating licence and turning a criminal probe into a test of academic freedom, institutional independence and the rule of law. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan signed the decree published in the Official Gazette on Friday, and the decision took immediate effect, ending the university’s ability to operate as a private institution.

The move follows the September 2025 seizure of Can Holding, the 121-company conglomerate that owned Bilgi, Haberturk, Show TV, Bloomberg HT and the Doğa Koleji private school chain. Prosecutors tied that takeover to allegations of fraud, smuggling, money laundering and tax evasion, and issued arrest warrants for 10 executives, with five detained initially. Turkey’s Savings Deposit Insurance Fund and state-appointed trustees were then placed in charge of the company’s assets and the university, a sequence that now reaches beyond corporate ownership and into the core of higher education.

For Bilgi’s students and staff, the consequences are immediate and deeply practical. The university has about 22,000 students, including around 3,400 who enrolled in 2025, and Turkish coverage said more than 20,000 students and roughly 1,000 academics are now facing uncertainty over transfers, exams, graduation procedures and jobs. Mimar Sinan University of Fine Arts has been reported as the guarantor school for Bilgi students, but the transition is expected to be complicated, especially for students in the middle of degree programs and faculty whose employment now depends on decisions taken by state authorities.

Bilgi was founded in 1996, bought by Can Holding in 2019, and had become one of Turkey’s better-known private universities, with more than 150 undergraduate, graduate and associate degree programs across multiple faculties and schools. The school says it joined Laureate International Universities in 2006, reflecting the international partnerships that now sit in doubt. Turkish media also describe Bilgi as one of the country’s early private foundation universities and the fourth such institution established in Turkey, which makes its forced closure a symbolic break as much as an administrative one. The decision signals how quickly a criminal investigation can be used to remake civil institutions in Turkey, leaving students, teachers and foreign academic partners to absorb the fallout.