Turkey has a new Tourism Minister

Turkey has officially switched to an executive presidency after President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan took the oath of office yesterday and announced the first cabinet under new presidential system.

Founder of Etstur Mehmet Ersoy becomes the new Tourism Minister of Turkey.

Born in Istanbul in 1968, Mehmet Ersoy, graduated from Istanbul German High School in 1987 and then moved to the business world by establishing Etstur in 1991 with Murat Ersoy, his twin brother. Starting their tour operator business from scratch, Mehmet Ersoy and his brother Murat Ersoy succeeded in taking Etstur to top in a short period while continuing to grow in the hotel management and tourism industries. Etsgroup operates a total of 13 five-star hotels with 12,000-bed capacity including a hotel chain of seven Voyage hotels, two Maxx Royal Resorts hotels in Bodrum and Antalya as well as Elexus Hotels & Resorts & Spa in Kemer and TRNC.

Etstur also hosts many brands under its roof; Didimtur; a travel agency serving for large masses, Jetset; a boutique travel agency preparing personal and luxury travel programs, Ucuzabilet.com; a web site selling affordable domestic and international flight tickets, Otelpuan.com, a web site featuring objective reviews of the guests about the properties, etstur.com/letsgo, online journal of Etstur covering articles and posts on travel trends and culture, Etsmice, a brand providing corporate traveling services, events, fairs etc.

In 2004, Etsgroup acquired 50 percent of the shares of Atlasjet, founded by Öger Holding, stepping into the aviation industry and it purchased all the shares of the airline in February 2006. Reaching a significant a position in the private airline business in a short period thanks to service-oriented rather than cost-based business mentality, the company moves forward under the name Atlasglobal due to an overhaul of its corporate identity in 2015.

Turkey’s new presidential governmental system has abolished the Prime Ministry and transferred all executive authority of the Prime Ministry office to the president, who will have sweeping powers, from appointing state officials to declaring state of emergency by presidential decrees, lacking considerable monitoring by parliament.