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Mainstream Turkish daily Milliyet had this front-page headliner on September 5: “Forced stop for namaz (Islamic prayer) on the road”. The news about an inter-city coach of Metro Tourism company making an unscheduled stop at a mosque, on its way from the Black Sea city of Samsun to Istanbul uncovered a problem that many private transportation companies have recently been facing. According to reports, some Islamist passengers on long distance bus routes are imposing upon the drivers to make stops near mosques at times of the five daily prayers. Islamist passengers insult the drivers that object and other passengers that protest their demands by calling them “un-Muslim” and “infidels”, and threaten to boycott the bus company. Having to wait for about half an hour in a bus parked next to a mosque until prayers are over cause irritation among other passengers, leading to arguments and tensions throughout the trip. Executives of bus companies told journalists that their drivers were recently facing such unacceptable demands that would potentially create a chaos in Turkey’s ground transportation network. An executive of Ulusoy bus company said, “these people also fly on airplanes; do they dare and ask the plane to be stopped too?”
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