Jailed Istanbul mayor Ekrem Imamoglu (@ekrem_imamoglu) has shared an illustration depicting his cell at Silivri Prison.

“I drew my room and my friends illustrated it,” Imamoglu—the popular politician who is widely thought to have what it takes to beat long-ruling Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in a fair election—said in an April 25 social media post.

Prisoners in Turkey use their X accounts with the assistance of their lawyers. In prison, they have no phone or internet access.

Imamoglu was detained around five weeks ago on March 19. Since then, he has not been seen in public. A short video featuring Imamoglu was shot by a citizen at the police station he was taken to on the day he was detained, while a photo of Imamoglu on a big screen at the prison courtroom where he appeared for an initial hearing on some charges he faces was released on April 11. Some illustrations of him in the courtroom have also been released.

New wave of detentions

On March 19, more than a hundred people were detained together with Imamoglu. On April 26, 54 more people were detained in a new wave of detentions.

In Turkey, such detention waves in political cases are common. During the Ergenekon trials held between 2007 and 2013 with the aim of eliminating the then military tutelage regime, dozens of detention waves were used.

“What happened? Couldn't you fill in your empty [court] file?” Imamoglu wrote on X in response to the new detentions.

His words were clearly aimed at Erdogan—Turkey’s ruler has been reiterating how more substantial evidence will be released in response to continuous questions over what Imamoglu’s supposed crimes are exactly.

“Have you been fooled again?” Imamoglu wrote.

Erdogan is well-known for various “We’ve been fooled” statements he has made on several occasions. He once claimed he was fooled by Fethullah Gulen (the late head of the Gulenists who were Erdogan’s allies but were later accused of mounting the 2016 failed coup), while the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (the banned PKK who, on the other hand, sometimes serve Erdogan’s purposes), Barack Obama and the EU are others the president claims to have been fooled by.

Two examples of Erdogan’s “We’ve been fooled” statements across different years on different occasions.

“Those who have turned the judiciary into an apparatus continue to betray the nation with new operations, blindly trying to remove the obstacles in front of whomever they have marketed the Canal Istanbul to,” Imamoglu also added.

On April 17, Imamoglu wrote on X that the government was exploiting the jailing of him to speed up the Canal Istanbul megaproject.

Wives’ turn

The wife of Imamoglu’s press secretary Murat Ongun was among those who were on April 26 detained.

“I had said: ‘What's next?’ It has proven to be an attack on the sacred,” Ongun (@Mrt_Ongun) wrote on X.

“You detained my precious one, who has committed no crime ahead of being my wife, at dawn before my children” he lamented.

“I thought wives and children were sacred? I thought they were immune from political conflicts? YOU HAVE NO CONSCIENCE!” Ongun added.

Ongun called on his friends to ensure his children are not deserted while their father is in prison and their mother is in detention.