$432.7 million spent on Turkey's gargantuan presidential palace so far, finance minister says

Turkey has spent over $600 million on a new presidential jet and presidential palace this year, Finance Minister Mehmet Şimşek has revealed, noting that the budget purse strings will be loosened for the facility more next year.

“Some $185 million will be paid for the new presidential jet from the prime ministry budget. Some $432.7 million has been paid for the construction of the new presidential palace as of now and some $135 million will be allocated for the palace in 2015,” Şimşek said at a meeting with Parliament’s Planning and Budget Commission.

The whole project value of the presidential palace was set at 1.37 billion Turkish Liras ($615 million), he added.

“The new Airbus A330-200 jet is now being used by the Turkish authorities. As the jet was originally acquired by Turkish Airlines and has not been transferred to the state yet, we have not yet made the payment from the budget yet. We plan to make the payment this year from the Prime Ministry budget,” he said.

Turkey spent 874 million liras of secret funds, while the National Intelligence Organization (MÄ°T) has spent 145.1 million liras up until Nov. 3 this year, he added.

The lion’s share of the secret funds were spent by the Prime Ministry with 618.4 million liras in expenditures, he said.

The Prime Ministry spent $280 million last year from the secret funds while MÄ°T had expenditures of $85.6 million, he noted.