Çiğdem Toker

In 1986, Çiğdem Toker started working for the culture section of Anka Ajansı in Ankara. Having successfully passed the entrance exam, she later worked as film dubbing expert at TRT TV. She then began to write for the newpaper Günaydın and the journal Nokta. When she passed the entrance exam of Anadolu Ajansı in 1988, she worked as a correspondent for the States Security Court and the Supreme Court for two years. From 1990 to 1993, she wrote for the weekly journal Ekonomik Panorama specialized in economy. 

Totally 15 years (between 1993 and 2008) she worked as economic correspondent for the newspaper Hürriyet in Ankara, with a focus on topics like privatization, energy politics and public procurement. Here, she wrote about the parliament’s yearly budget, fiscal legislation and new laws developed by the Planning and Budget Commission, for instance during the crisis in 2001. She also analysed the results of international meetings in which Turkey participated.

In 2009, she became the first chief of Ankara Bureau of the newly founded newspaper Habertürk in Ankara. Shortly after that, she started writing for the newspaper Akşam of which she was also chief of Ankara Bureau until 2013. She decided to quit when the Savings Deposit Insurance Fund (TMSF) took control over the newspaper.

Since 2013 she has been writing as a columnist for the daily newspaper Cumhuriyet.

Çiğdem Toker was selected for the 2015 European Press Prize shortlist with ‘The Mystery of the Secret Funds—and—Who are you Fooling?‘