KEY POINTS:
BRUSSELS - Turkey is in crisis because of a wife's headscarf.
The prospect of the country's next President being married to someone who chooses to wear the veil has plunged the country into the most serious political and economic crisis for years, even prompting fears of a military coup.
Turkey's top court yesterday intervened in the country's biggest political crisis for years, striking down the result of a vote among MPs for the key post of President.
The decision increases the likelihood of fresh parliamentary elections and may help to defuse a looming confrontation between Turkey's Islamist Government and the military, which sees itself as the guardian of the secular Turkish state.
Amid mounting tension in which hundreds of May Day protesters were detained by police, the Constitutional Court in Ankara ruled in favour of an Opposition request to block the election by MPs of Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul, who represents the ruling Islamist AK Party.
The court decided that too few parliamentarians were present when the first round was held in the assembly last week.
Turkey's secular establishment has reacted with alarm to the prospect of Gul taking over the presidential palace once occupied by the founder of the secular state, Mustafa Kemal Attaturk.
Gul's wife, Hayrunisa, is a well-known public figure in Turkey and often accompanies her husband on overseas visits, wearing her headscarf, a potent reminder of her husband's political roots. In fact, she once took Turkey to the European Court of Human Rights for denying her a diploma because she wore a headscarf, dropping the case only when Gul took up his ministerial post.
Though regarded as pro-European and moderate, Gul was a member of an Islamist movement outlawed by the courts in 1998.
The Army warned the Government last weekend to stick to Turkey's secular principles after Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan nominated Gul as his candidate for President.
The declaration from the military high command provoked alarm abroad because the Turkish Army has forced four Governments from power since 1960.
In 1997 it helped push out a Government it deemed an Islamist threat. Gul was a member of the 1997 Government.
Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets to protest as the standoff developed into a major political crisis, prompting a run on the Turkish lira and in the markets.
The secularist establishment fears that if the AK Party secures control of the presidency it will use its unprecedented power to chip away at Turkey's secular system.
The party, which has sought unsuccessfully to criminalise adultery and restrict alcohol sales, denies the charge.
Sinan Ulgn, chairman of the Centre for Economic and Foreign Policy Studies think-tank in Istanbul, said: "There is a real fear among some parts of the Turkish population that the AK Party's agenda is to move Turkey towards a more conservative, Islamic, society and the headscarf is one of the most visible and symbolic elements of the agenda.
"Abdullah Gul himself is somebody who, if we had not had the problems of the headscarf, would have been welcomed by most of the establishment."
Spokesman Cemil Cicek said the Government was willing to bring elections forward provided Parliament passes constitutional changes reducing the minimum age for legislators to 25.
But the Government is tomorrow expected to proceed with the second round of voting for the post of President, even though it is unlikely to win the backing of enough MPs to secure Gul's election because of an Opposition boycott.
The Constitutional Court ruled that 367 members of Parliament had to be present during voting for its results to be valid. A total of 361 deputies voted in the first ballot last Friday, 357 of them for Gul.
Parliament is required to call for a new general election if it cannot elect a new head of state. President Ahmet Necdet Sezer's term ends on May 16.
The ferocity of the Army's reaction to Gul's nomination may be explained by the fact that the military high command had been led to believe Erdogan intended to nominate Defence Minister Vecdi Gonul for the presidency.
Gonul is in regular contact with the military because of his position and his wife does not wear a headscarf.
But it emerged that the Speaker of the Parliament, Bulent Arinc, threatened to stand himself if neither Gul nor Erdogan were nominated for the position to represent the more religious wing of the AK Party.
If Erdogan does call parliamentary elections his AK Party is well placed to win a new majority. It remains unclear whether he would put forward Gul or an alternative candidate for the presidency.
- INDEPENDENT
Cancelled first-round vote puts pressure on timetable
Parliament chooses the President in a series of up to four votes. In the first and second rounds, a candidate must receive 367 votes, or two-thirds of all deputies. In the third round, a candidate needs only a simple majority - 276 votes. If a fourth round produces no winner, a parliamentary election is called.
The Constitutional Court has cancelled last week's first-round vote, ruling that not enough MPs were present. The court upheld an appeal from the main Opposition party, which boycotted the vote, that a quorum of 367 deputies was needed.
The Government will repeat the first round, trying to secure a quorum. It can repeat the first round again, but must complete all rounds within 30 days of the start of the nomination process. This began on April 16, meaning that the new President is due to be sworn in on May 16. A three-day interval is needed between each round, making the timetable very tight now. Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul remains the only candidate.
- REUTERS
