Turkey is still in shock following a scandal involving the well-known restaurant chain Köfteci Yusuf, which owns hundreds of outlets and franchises across the country, after an inspection by the Ministry of Agriculture found that the meat dishes they sell to the public contain pork.
Turkish media reported that the scandal – which has become front page news in the media and a trending topic on social media – erupted after the ministry published a list of companies and establishments that sell products deemed ‘contaminated or adulterated in a manner dangerous to human health’; while the name of the well-known chain was initially kept hidden, it has now been revealed that Köfteci Yusuf appeared on the list.
The ministerial report was drawn up on the basis of a series of inspections carried out last February at two restaurant franchises of the Köfteci Yusuf chain, which is based in Yenişehır (Bursa) but has a total of 280 restaurants throughout Turkey. Tests found that the köfte (meat dumplings) and veal döner sold in the two restaurants contained ‘pork’ (domuz eti, in Turkish), which is obviously not mentioned among the ingredients used in the product, as required by law.
The two restaurants inspected are reportedly located in Etimesgut and Çankaya, both two metropolitan districts of Ankara city. After the news spread widely on social media, many customers of the franchise who had bought prepared meat tried to return the products, but found that the franchise refuses to accept the meat back and does not respond to customers’ calls, reports Turkish media.
Köfteci Yusuf defends itself from accusations
For their part, officials of the restaurant chain issued a statement denying the accusations and assuring that ‘it is impossible for a company with 280 franchises throughout Turkey and employing 12,000 people’ to commit adulteration of its products and put its entire business at risk.
According to the statement released by Köfteci Yusuf, during the ministerial inspection, several ‘technical errors’ were made in the collection of samples that led to adulterated results that do not correspond to reality, and denounces that the authorities did not give part of the samples to the company’s managers to compare them and determine the source of the problem.
‘They could have left us a reference sample of the original material, given that we have only one production site. These meat products were not produced by our brand,’ the company said in the statement, which goes so far as to attribute the results to “the action of malicious persons” or “contamination of samples not attributable to our company” during the genetic tests carried out following the inspections.
‘The best proof of this is that the samples taken by the public prosecutor’s office from the same batch as our döner product that was said to be adulterated, have come out clean, and that no negative aspects have been found in the inspections and controls carried out to date,’ the company insisted.
The statement from the famous restaurant chain stresses that, according to the usual protocols, when these anomalous results were detected, the two franchises affected should have been informed immediately; however, it adds, ‘we cannot clarify the incident because the unfavourable reports reached us too late and through unconventional channels’, and regrets that after keeping silent to respect the ongoing judicial process, it has had to come to its defence ‘due to the leak of confidential documents from the ministry to the press’. For now, the investigation continues, while the founder and owner of Köfteci Yusuf, Yusuf Akkaş, remains silent on the scandal.
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Edited and reviewed by:
Pablo Gómez is a specialist in Turkey and has been editor-in-chief of Hispanatolia since 2011. He has been analysing current affairs and geopolitics in Turkey and the surrounding region since 2006.
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