TURKEY'S NEXT PRESIDENT: FM ABDULLAH GUL

UNCLAS ANKARA 000944 SIPDIS SENSITIVE SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PGOV PINR TU SUBJECT: TURKEY'S NEXT PRESIDENT: FM ABDULLAH GUL REF: ANKARA 916 AND PREVIOUS ¶1. (U) The suspense is over. PM Tayyip Erdogan, at an April 24 meeting of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), announced that FM and Deputy PM Abdullah Gul is AKP's candidate to be Turkey's 11th president. AKP has the votes to elect its candidate by the third round, all but assuring Gul's ascension to head of state. ¶2. (U) After months of speculation, largely focused on whether Erdogan would run, AKP has put its top diplomat and world statesman forward as its presidential candidate. Erdogan's announcement was greeted with tumultuous applause and cheers from assembled AKP MPs. Gul's nomination makes sense for AKP: --It places the top three AKP figures in the country in the top three positions: Gul as President and head of state; Bulent Arinc as speaker of parliament (and number two in protocol rank after the President); and Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who remains by far the country's most popular political figure, as PM in the run-up to parliamentary elections later this year. --It moves into in Ataturk's seat in Cankaya an English-speaking world statesman who can, as Erdogan has emphasized in recent weeks, represent Turkey ably at home and abroad. --It puts a "headscarf" in Cankaya, the first real victory for the pious in AKP after nearly five years in power. This was the longest-running objection to Erdogan, whose wife Emine is covered; Gul's wife, Hayrinussa, wears a headscarf as well. ¶3. (SBU) Gul has been a figure on the Turkish national political scene since 1991, when he was first elected to parliament as an MP for Necmettin Erbakan's pro-Islam Welfare Party. Prior to that, he worked for eight years as an economist at the Islamic Development Bank in Jeddah. Reelected to parliament in 1995, he served as State Minister and government spokesman in then-PM Erbakan's short-lived government. Gul became a founding member of AKP in August 2001, where he has always been both Erdogan's closest political partner and rival. Gul served as Prime Minister from December 3, 2002 until March 14, 2003, when Erdogan was sworn in. He has been a leading figure in Turkey's push for EU membership; the drama of Gul's late-night arrival in Luxembourg on October 3, 2005 to launch Turkey's formal candidacy riveted Turks. As FM, Gul enjoys good relations with many of his European and Middle Eastern counterparts. Gul, less fiery and more predictable than Erdogan, presents to the world the reasonable, carefully considered face of Turkish politics. ¶4. (SBU) In announcing Gul's candidacy, Erdogan stated that he had taken the (anti-AKP) arrows over the past months, leaving Gul virtually untouched. As Foreign Minister, Gul has maintained good relations with the military, who will have to consider how they will deal with a non-Erdogan AKPer -- with a headscarved wife -- in Cankaya. Of the "top three" AKP, Gul is arguably the most palatable to the military, though he carries the weight of AKP outreach to Hamas, of which the military strongly disapproved. For AKP, he is a consensus candidate around whom all can rally; he has little of Erdogan's baggage. For the opposition, Gul is less easy to bash than Erdogan. He has carried Turkey's flag to the EU, as well as on national consensus issues such as Cyprus and Armenia, most recently visiting the "TRNC" ten days ago. ¶5. (U) The presidential election calendar, as just announced by parliament's consultative board, will be as follows: --Friday, April 27: first round --Wednesday, May 2: second round --Wednesday, May 9: third round --Tuesday, May 15 (if needed): fourth and final round. Visit Ankara's Classified Web Site at http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/eur/ankara/ WILSON