Ali Nihat Yazici

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Ali Nihat Yazici (b. 1964 in Adapazari, Turkey) is the president of the Turkish Chess Federation. In the last few years, he has increased membership in this organization from less than 10,000 members to more than 125,000 members, making it the fastest growing chess organization in the world today.

He is a candidate for Deputy President of FIDE. Known for staging numerous international chess tournaments - for instance the European individual, team and youth championships in the last few years.

Ali Nihat has been a driving force in the number of World and European Chess Championships that the Turkish Chess Federation have staged in the past years.

In 1987 he attended the Technical University of Istanbul to study electronic and communication engineering.

In 1994 he did an MBA degree at the Middle East Technical University, and in 1996 completed the highest honour degree of IAB (International Academy of Broadcasting) in Montreux, Switzerland. He has worked as an engineer in the Turkish Radio Television Corporation, becoming Chief Engineer of the TRT in 1992, and Head of the TV department of TRT in 1999.

In 2000 Ali was elected President of Turkish Chess Federation. He is a board member of the ECU (European Chess Union), Deputy President of the MCA (Mediterrenean Chess Association), Chairman of FIDE's Chess in Schools Commission, FIDE Rules and Tournaments Regulations Committee Member, a FIDE International Arbiter and FIDE international Chess Organiser.

As the president of the Turkish Chess Federation, Ali has successfully campaigned to make chess an elective course in all primary schools -- from September 2005 chess is being offered in all schools in Turkey. The Federation expects to have around 100,000 members by the end of 2005 and, quite unabashedly, one million by the end of 2008. They are aiming at 12,000 chess teachers for the Primary Schools. Ali has recruited GMs Predrag Nikolic, Vassily Ivanchuk (who now speaks fluent Turkish) and Mikhail Gurevich for 7-10 days training camps. Below one can find some of the tournaments that Turkey will be organising in the near future.