Former Miss Turkey winner, Merve Buyuksarac, could be sent to jail for two years on charges of 'insulting a public official'. All because of a poem she posted on her Instagram account. The poem allegedly insulted Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. While the post has since been deleted, Hurriyet Daily News describes it as a satirical text titled "The Master's Poem." It had originally appeared in the Turkish magazine Uykusuz, a satirical publication which prides itself on mocking the Turkish political establishment and Erdoğan in particular. Buyuksarac was questioned by police about the poem last month. "I don't precisely recall the content I have shared on my Instagram account," she said, according to a report from Cihan news agency. "However, I might have taken excerpts from Twitter, other social media websites or the cartoon magazine Uykusuz.I shared it because it was funny to me, I did not intend to insult Recep Tayyip Erdoğan."
- Merve Buyuksarac has 15,000 followers on Instagram and 30,000 on Twitter.
- More than 60 people have been charged for their mockery of Erdoğan since August: Just a couple of months ago, a 16-year-old high school student was arrested after making a speech in which he described Erdoğan as "the thieving owner of the illegal palace."
- The Turkish president is no fan of social media either. “Twitter, mwitter!” is how he infamously put it last year, shortly before he put in force a wide-ranging yet ultimately ineffective ban on the social network.