Oktay Eksi: The first day

The election of Abdullah Gul has forced us all through an incredibly difficult period. But the democratic system and the Turkish nation, which knows how to find solutions without departing from the basic rules of justice, has led us all to this final conculsion, which shows "legitimacy."
 
What falls to all of us at this stage is to accept the reality that Abdullah Gul is in fact the 11th President, and to help him for as long as he stays faithful to the vows he has taken before the Turkish nation.

President Gul has undertaken very serious responsibilities. And the truth is, even if he stays faithful to none of them, he will not have to explain his actions to anyone, just as long as he does not enter into actions which could be classified as "traitorous to the nation."

 
But in the short term it will be the Turkish public, and in the long term, history, which will watch and scrutinize Gul closely.
 
What both the public and history will want from him is that he be a president who "represents the Turkish people, who carries out the Turkish Constitution, and who works in harmony and order with the various organs of the state."

But this will not be all: every moment of his presidency will see Gul's own "objectivity" and "solution-finding" capabilities questioned.

One thing though-from time to time in Turkey, the very concept of "objectivity" is misunderstood.
 
First and foremost, the President is the "head of state." Due to this, the president must be at one with the "philosophy with which the state was formed." For example, he does not have the right to say "This state was formed upon the principles of secularity, but I do not think this is right. I don't think it's necessary that it continue that way."

 
If he says this, or even starts casting his route in that direction, he will lose his legitimacy as president. To put in another way, he does not have the luxury of being "objective" when it comes to the philosophy on which our state was formed.

Along the same lines, he cannot talk of "objectivity" when it comes to the Constitution, the Turkish nation, the flag, nor the many principles he vowed in his oath to protect.
 
And thus we can only wish Gul the best of luck on his first day as President, and hope that he is a President worthy of the Republic which the great Ataturk formed.