Mayoral Throne of Doom

doom links to original article

(Sabah Newspaper, 5 September 2013)

Hotseat and four who got burned.

Cafer Yildirim (60), the mayor of Acarlar town in Incirliova
district of Aydin province, died of a heart attack yesterday.
Previoulsy, three Acarlar mayors, two of them back-to-back,
died during their first year in office. The townspeople have
declared the mayoral chair to be inauspicious.

Yesterday Yildirim, of the AK Party, suddenly became ill during
an argument with town official P. S. around noon.  After initial treatment
by emergency services, Yildirim was taken to Aydin Ataturk State
Hospital where it was determined that he had had a heart attack and
he was placed in intensive care. Despite all efforts, Mayor Yildirim
lost his life around 6 p.m.  His funeral will be held today following noon
prayers and he will then be buried at Acarlar Cemetery.

The mayoral deaths, which have created surprise and sadness among the
townspeople, began in 1994 when Mayor Durmus Ali Akcan (57) died
of a heart attack. Yunus Senturk of the AK Party took office after the
local election in 2009 but died on 19 January 2012. He was replaced by
Adnan Yildiz, a municipal council member also from the AK Party, but
Yildiz had a heart attack after only eight months in office and died on
6 September 2012.

Mayor Cafer Yildirim, also an AK Party municipal council member,
took office on 14 September 2012. Yildirim, married and the father of
three children, said following the publication last year of a story in the
Yeni Asir newspaper after the death of Mayor Adnan Yildiz entitled
"He Who Sits Here Dies", that he wouldn't pay any attention to such
nonsense.  Referring to the mumbling about the three mayors who died
in office that "this mayoral chair is inauspicious, he who sits in it dies",
Yildirim had said that "this is superstition. I won't change this chair that
others say is inauspicious."

 

Incirliova left of Aydin city.