A social media poll conducted by journalist Fatih Portakal on the anniversary of Turkey’s July 15, 2016 coup attempt showed widespread skepticism among respondents toward the official narrative of the failed putsch and the state commemoration built around it.
Portakal, a prominent Turkish journalist and television presenter, asked his followers on X how they viewed July 15, which the government marks as Democracy and National Unity Day.
About 21,000 people voted in the online poll.
The largest group, 46.5 percent, chose the answer “I don’t believe in this day.”
Another 29.8 percent said “many questions remain.”
A further 11.4 percent described July 15 as “the day the regime changed,” while 12.3 percent said the day “should be embraced.”
Taken together, 76.3 percent of respondents either said they did not believe in the official commemoration or said many questions remained.
If those who described July 15 as the day the regime changed are also counted among respondents critical of the official account, the share rises to 87.7 percent.
The poll was not scientific and cannot be treated as a representative measure of Turkish public opinion. It reflected responses from Portakal’s social media audience and did not use random sampling or demographic weighting.
Its significance lies instead in what it suggests about the persistence of public doubt eight years after the coup attempt.
July 15 remains one of the most contested events in modern Turkish history. The government presents it as a failed military coup defeated by popular resistance, while critics point to unanswered questions about the chain of command, intelligence failures, civilian deaths, armed civilians, the conduct of trials and the sweeping purge that followed.
Ankara blames the coup attempt on the Gülen movement, a transnational civic initiative inspired by Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen, and designates the movement as a terrorist organization. The movement denies involvement in the coup or any terrorist activity.
After the coup attempt, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s government declared a state of emergency and ruled by decree for two years.
More than 100,000 public servants were dismissed, thousands of judges, prosecutors, military personnel, police officers, academics and teachers were removed from their posts, and media outlets, schools, associations and businesses were shut down.
Critics say the post-coup period was used to rebuild the state around Erdoğan’s executive presidency, weaken judicial independence and eliminate opponents far beyond those accused of direct involvement in the coup attempt.
