Death toll at Istanbul construction site reveals dark side of building boom in Turkey

The dark side of Turkey’s labor sector was laid bare with the Sept. 6 incident in which 10 workers were killed at a luxury high-rise construction site in Istanbul, but danger is a constant feature of life for laborers around the country, where only 42,000 of 1.6 million workers across Turkey have social security.

According to the July data of the Labor Ministry, 1.6 million workers are registered as working in the construction and road construction sector, although more are thought to be employed in the field. However, only 42,000 workers are registered with the social security system which allows people to obtain health care and pensions.

Workers at the accident site have accused the construction company of ignoring all their warnings despite being informed about the continual problems with the lift.

Emrah Acar, one of those tasked with looking after the elevator at the Torun Center site in Mecidiyeköy, told daily Vatan they had been using very rudimentary tricks to keep it functioning for more than two months after a major breakdown in the device’s brake mechanism.

“The elevator was going off the rails and whenever it derailed, we would press the ‘emergency stop’ button and slam the cabin into the walls to make it stop… I have been telling officials for two months that the braking mechanism was not functioning. If they would have listened, this disaster would not have happened,” Acar said.  

Acar also questioned how Hıdır Genç, a worker that only started working at the site five days ago and perished in the accident, was named as the person responsible for the elevator during the evening shift. “I had told him to press the emergency stop button. I believe he didn’t press the button. Or maybe he did...