Salih Hulusi Pasha


Salih Hulusi Pasha, known as Salih Hulusi Kezrak after the Turkish Surname Law of 1934, was one of the last Grand Viziers of the Ottoman Empire, under the reign of the last Ottoman Sultan Mehmed VI, between 8 March 1920 and 2 April 1920. Since he had been unable to form a government, and as part of the chain of events following the occupation of Istanbul by the Allies, he was dismissed from office by the sultan under foreign pressure on 2 April. His dismissal was to be followed by the official closure of the Parliament itself on 5 April, thus putting an end to the Second Constitutional Era of the Ottoman Empire.
In terms of effective shaping of policies by the remaining Ottoman state structure, his office are usually considered as mere intervals between the two offices of Damat Ferid Pasha, the signatory of the Treaty of Sèvres.
Prior to his premiership, Salih Hulusi Pasha held the office of the Minister of the Marine under two preceding governments and also under his successor Ahmet Tevfik Pasha. At a time when Turkey had two governments, he was often charged with contacts with the rising Ankara government set up by Mustafa Kemal Pasha. With the end of the Ottoman monarchy, Hulusi Salih Pasha retired from politics and, after having adopted the surname "Kezrak" under the 1934 Surname Law in Turkey, died in 1939 in Istanbul.
Kezrak's father, Ferik Dilaver Pasha, was a Circassian Lieutenant general in the Ottoman Navy, who published Dilaver Pasha Regulations during his service as Minister of Mining in 1865.