( Reuters ) - Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul, a former Islamist, is set to be elected Turkey's next president on Tuesday in a move the secular elite says will bring religion back into public life and undermine the secular republic.
Gul has established himself as a respected diplomat since his AK Party was first elected in 2002, securing the launch of Turkey's European Union entry talks. He pledges to be a leader for all Turks, but he is not to the taste of a military which suspects AK of harboring a secret Islamist agenda.
Armed forces chief General Yasar Buyukanit said on Monday he saw consistent efforts to undermine the secular republic, a statement suggesting the army would not stand on the sidelines if it saw the separation between Mosque and state threatened.
"It is clear that the statement of the army includes warnings against any anti-secular action that could come from the government," said Ozgur Altug, an economist at Raymond James in Istanbul. The lira weakened on the comments late on Monday.
The secular elite and Turkey's generals, who have ousted four governments since 1960, are wary of Gul's Islamist past and alarmed at the prospect of a woman, his wife, wearing the Islamic headscarf in the Cankaya presidential palace.
The headscarf is for many a potent symbol of the religious influence soldier-turned-politician Mustafa Kemal Ataturk banished from public life when he founded the modern Western- style republic on the ruins of the Ottoman Empire.
Gul is set to win the third round of voting when the AK Party only needs an absolute majority to secure the post. In the previous two rounds in the chamber they failed because a two-thirds majority was required.
The AK Party has 341 seats in the 550-seat chamber.
Turkey has been mired in political turmoil since April when the Islamist-rooted AK Party first nominated Gul as their candidate. The crisis sparked early parliamentary elections.
Appointing Gul marks a sweet victory for the AK Party. It completes their capture of all top state institutions in the NATO-member country.
"Cankaya, which some now claim has fallen, does not belong to this or that group or a certain elitist group, but to the 70 million (Turks)," Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said last week.
In Turkey, the government holds most power but the president can veto laws and appointments of officials, and name judges. The post carries moral weight as it was first held by Ataturk.
Erdogan and Gul say they are loyal to the secular system and that their party's July landslide win, with 47 percent of the vote, gives the foreign minister a strong presidential mandate.
During the past five years of AK Party government, Gul has championed Turkey's EU bid, and helped push through human rights reforms and judicial amendments. He says he would continue to support the difficult EU process as president.
Few expect the army to intervene directly after their strong public statements in April appeared to backfire and helped secure more votes for the AK Party in July elections.
"I think we'll see a sort of gentlemen's agreement emerge whereby the AK Party won't interfere in the secular nature of public life and the army won't intervene in everything at the political level," said Dogu Ergil of Ankara University.
"The army is back in the barracks but its soldiers are still keeping guard and remain on the lookout," the professor said.