Ümit Sayın, an associate professor who is accused by the police of being a mentor for Ergenekon leaders, said in a conference in Ankara in November last year that the Justice and Development Party's (AK Party) plans to adopt a new constitution were a reason for the military to stage a coup. Among the participants of the conference were retired Col. Oğuz Kalecioğlu and retired Brig. Gen. Alattin Parmaksız, the former commander of Hakkari's Mountain Rangers Brigade, video and pictures from the conference organized by the Turkish World Human Rights Associations showed. The footage shows Sayın saying "They are trying to change the Constitution. They measure the reactions and then take steps back. In fact, this is a reason for a coup d'état. If this was going on in the '80s, a coup would have been staged. They want to change the constitution and divide Turkey. They are going step by step so conspicuously that the [Turkish Armed Forces (TSK)] now has to say something. Things can't go on like this. But we are not seeing anything."
He continued: "If you ask my opinion, I favor a coup d'état. Nothing else can save us. Parliament was turned into how it is now with the 1980 coup. It should be fixed the way it was ruined." He also asserted that in any other country President Abdullah Gül and Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan would have been brought down by the army, adding that Erdoğan is working to divide the country.
He said in the footage that every country has its own deep state, a term that denotes clandestine and armed mechanisms that carry out assassinations or bombings to further their own political agenda. Sayın said Turkey did not have a deep state, implying that if it did it would not be in its current situation. He said the National Security Council (MGK) previously functioned as a safety brake. "The MGK has now turned into an association of canary lovers. It has no influence whatsoever," he told the audience.
Speaking about late President Turgut Özal and President Gül, he said, "I don't believe these presidents work for Turkey or for Turks." He claimed Erdoğan and Gül had ties to the secret services of foreign powers.
Sayın also described himself as being anti-Semitic, saying that Jewish people were fanatical, racist and in favor of religious law. "Hitler was right about certain things," he said.
He expressed his opinion that the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the US were the work of the Israeli Mossad intelligence agency. He also claimed that the ruling AK Party had not won 47 percent of the vote in the elections on July 22, 2007, but instead only 30 percent.
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