Turkey's Ruling Party Invites Controversy with Repeat Presidential Nomination

World | August 14, 2007, Tuesday // 00:00

Turkey's AK party, which saw its comfortable parliamentary majority upheld at last month's elections, has nominated Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul for president on Tuesday.

Although the AK does not have the two-thirds majority in the legislature, needed to win in either of the first two rounds of voting, it does have more than 51% of the seats required to win in the third or fourth rounds, making Gul a virtual certainty to win the job.

The first ballot will be held on August 20

It was Gul's first presidential bid in spring that split the country, bringing millions of supporters of the secularist state out in the streets to protest his nomination.

Gul and AK have strong roots in political Islam, and his wife wears the Islamic headscarf, which is banned in state institutions.

Secularists fear that the party is pursuing an Islamist agenda and a president with Islamist sympathies would seriously endanger the secularist state in Turkey.

The army, which sees itself as the guardian of the secular regime, has criticised Gul's nomination, but stopped short of threatening a new military coup if he is elected.

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