It has become necessary to issue the following press release upon the news report published in Cumhuriyet newspaper today with the headline “Young Bilals”.

Traditional Beautiful Holy Koran Reciting, Hafızlık and Azan Reciting Contests held by our ministry’s General Directorate of Religious Education have been carried out for many years. These contests are held in order to encourage imam hatip school students to develop their interest, gift and personal skills, professional competence, self-confidence, enhancing the feeling of belonging to the school and social progress within the framework of basic objectives of the Ministry of National Education.

Bilal Habeşi is the first name that comes to the mind when mentioning about azan (Muslim call for prayer) in the 1400 year long history of Islam and was the first person who recited the azan and the person who served as the muezzin of the Prophet (pbuh) until his demise. Just like Sultan Mehmet the conqueror is remembered when we talk about the conquest of İstanbul or Itri when we talk about music or Sinan the Architect when we talk about architecture, we think about Bilal Habeşi when we talk about the azan. This is a very well-known fact. The newspaper report that led to a complete different interpretation of the event which in essence was aimed at naming the contests after such a historical figure in order to motivate students and encourage them to recite the azan as beautiful as Bilal Habeşi did is an important example of distortion which should be taken up as a case study in the communication courses (of universities).

We would respectfully like to inform the public

Press and Public Relations Office