We continue our round up of the local news from Fethiye, Muğla and surrounding area.

Rough Justice

A 12-year-old boy ended up with a knife wound this week after an incident outside his school.

Apparently the boy, identified only by his initials ‘EB’, had been taunting an older girl at the school with gossip about her family.

When he left school at the end of the day, the girl’s older brother, father and uncle were waiting and set upon EB. He was punched and then stabbed under his arm.

The wound took five stitches at the hospital and police are now investigating the incident.

Beggars Shipped Out

Fethiye Zabita this week targeted beggars in all areas of the town and its environs.

Five were arrested and all turned out to have come to Fethiye from other places: Denizli, Uşak, Çanakkale and Bursa.

They were each fined and then put on buses to their places of origin – ‘run out of town’ no less.

Election Fever

Even local readers who speak no Turkish can’t have helped noticing the bunting currently strung across most of the main streets in Fethiye, and the vans and minibuses driving around covered in slogans and playing loud music.

So for anyone who does not know, we confirm it is all in aid of the general election which takes place on 12th June.

Prime Minister Visits Muğla on Election Campaign Trail

Prime Minister Recep Tayıp Erdoğan flew into Muğla by helicopter on Friday to make a public speech (the MP for Muğla belongs to the opposition party, and that party has held Muğla for the past 40 years), and then perform the official opening of the Akköprü Dam on the Dalaman River.

An estimated 20,000 people turned out to listen to him in a park in Muğla, where he spoke for one and a quarter hours.

Indeed, he apparently over-ran so much, and used up so much energy whilst speaking, that in the end he got back into his helicopter and flew away, leaving one of his Ministers to do the official dam opening.

He may have gained votes in Muğla, but how many did he lose in Dalaman?