New Anatolian, Turkey
Aug 18 2007

ABDULLAH GUL : A devout Muslim with a western mind

The New Anatolian / Ankara

18 August 2007

Abdullah Gül (born October 29, 1950) is the deputy prime minister,
foreign minister of Turkey, and presidential candidate.

Born in Kayseri to Ahmet Hamdi, an imam, and Adviye, Gül was brought
up in a conservative family environment. His great-grandfather was an
Arab who immigrated from Siirt to Develi around 1915. Gül was also
called with the name Cumhur by his family.

Gül studied economics at the University of Istanbul and wrote his
dissertation there. During his graduate education, he studied for two
years in London and Exeter. He pursued an academic career after that
and worked at the higher education facilities in Adapazari,
collaborating in the establishment of a department for industrial
engineering and teaching management courses of future Sakarya
University. Between 1983 and 1991, he worked at the Islamic
Development Bank (IDB). In 1991, Gül became a lecturer in
international management.

Gül became acquainted with right-wing politics early during his high
school years. During his university education, he became a member of
Islamist-nationalist Millî Türk Talebe Birligi or National Turkish
Student’s Union in the line of Necip Fazil’s Büyük Dogu (Grand
Orient) current. He was elected a member of the Turkish parliament
for Refah Partisi (RP, "the Welfare Party") from Kayseri in 1991 and
1995.

He was named state minister in the Erbakan government in 1996 but the
government was forced out of office by the military in 1997. The
supreme court closed down the Welfare Party claiming it was Islamic
fundamentalist.

In 1999, he kept his seat as a member of Fazilet Partisi (FP, "the
Virtue Party"), successor to Welfare Party. He felt the Welfare Party
as well as the FP were both archaic and that such conservative
parties needed serious reformation. So along with Recep Tayyip
Erdogan he led the reformation movement within the FP. He challenged
the leadership and at a convention became candidate for chairman. He
lost with a few votes and his challenge shook the foundations of the
Islamic movement. When the FP was closed down by the constitutional
court he and his colleagues founded the Justice and Development (AK)
Party (Adalet ve Kalkinma Partisi). The founders of the AK Party
accepted that they came from religious roots but vehemently opposed
their party having a religious agenda. They said the party members
were devout Muslims but the party distanced itself from political
Islam.

Gul was elected again to represent Kayseri, in 2002, and in November
2002 was appointed Prime Minister.

Gül’s first challenge came as prime minister when he had to be
involved in sensitive negotiations with the United States surrounding
any Turkish participation in the Iraq war. A parliamentary motion
allowing U.S. to use Turkish soil against Saddam Hussein and sending
Turkish troops to Iraq was defeated. This was regarded as a major
setback for Gul.

However, after becoming foreign minister in March 2003 he rapidly
found his feet in his new role, becoming the key player not only in
Turkey’s attempts to receive an accession date for the European
Union, but also in its attempts to improve relations with Syria and
maintain its special relationship with the Turkic-speaking countries
of Central Asia and the Caucasus. He also played a key role in
shaping more moderate policies on Cyprus.

On February 6, 2007, Gül flew to the United States to meet with
Condoleezza Rice and President George W. Bush in order to dissuade a
law from reaching the floor of the US House of Representatives that
would recognize the deaths of Armenians in 1915 as the Armenian
Genocide

Prime Minister Erdogan announced on April 24, 2007 that Gül will be
the Justice and Development Party candidate in the 2007 presidential
election. Previously, there had been speculation that Erdogan himself
would be the party’s candidate, which had provoked substantial
opposition from secularists. Mass rallies were held by the
secularists.

The opposition groups in Parliament effectively blocked Gul’s
election and then cancelled the ballots at the supreme court. Gül
stepped down from candidacy on May 6, 2007. Early elections for July
22 were scheduled.

A few days later, on 11 May when inquired after the amendments to the
Turkish constitution which now allowed the people to elect the
president directly rather than a parliamentary vote, Gül announced
that his candidacy was ongoing despite stating that he had pulled his
candidacy on 6 May.

The amendments did not go into force because President Ahmet Necdet
Sezer wanted a referendum on the issue. The referendum is scheduled
for October 21 so the newly elected Parliament was charged to elect
the new president. If the amendment are approved by the referendum
then the next president will be elected by the people.

The AK Party said it had been denied the right to elect Gul as
president and played this effectively through out the elections
campaign as a gross injustice. The party won a massive landslide in
the elections gaining 46.6 percent of the votes. The party and its
leadership said the nation had not only given it a mandate to run the
country for another five years but also wanted to see Gul as
president.

The party has now decided to officially name Gul as its candidate for
president.

On August 21, 1980, Abdullah Gül married Hayrünnisa Özyurt (b. 1965),
and the couple has three children, two sons named Mehmet Emre and
Ahmet Münir and a daughter named Kübra. He is a dedicated fan of the
football club Besiktas.