ANKARA, April 24 (Xinhua) -- Turkish Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul was nominated on Tuesday as the ruling party's candidate in the forthcoming presidential elections,ending speculations that Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan will run for the post himself.

    Turkey's 550-member parliament, which is dominated by lawmakers from Erdogan's Justice and Development Party (AKP), is expected to elect Gul, a close ally of Erdogan, as the country's next president in a series of votes starting on April 27.

    The new head of state will take office next month, replacing current Turkish President Ahmet Necdet Sezer, a staunchly pro-secular president, whose seven-year-term will expire on May 16."After all our research and discussions for the 11th president,our dear Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul has been chosen as candidate for the presidency," Erdogan, who is the ruling AKPleader, told his party's long-awaited parliamentary group meeting in Ankara.

    Earlier, Turkey's secularists feared that if Erdogan became the next president of the secular Muslim country, his ruling Islamic-rooted party would be able to boost the role of Islam.

    On April 14, more than 300,000 people demonstrated in Ankara in defence of the country's secular system and against Erdogan's possible run.

    According to Erdogan, a survey was carried out with the participation of nearly 30,000 members of his ruling party about the presidential elections.

    "I listened to views of provincial chairmen. I also held talks with representatives of some non-governmental organizations," he said on Monday.

    Local media reported last week that more than half of 50 members of the Central Executive Board of the ruling party called on Prime Minister Erdogan to stay as leader of the AKP instead of running for presidency.

    The board also demanded that there should be a strong president and a strong prime minister from the AKP.

    However, the nomination of Gul, a close ally of Erdogan, would not likely to ease the tensions between the AKP and the country's secularists over the presidential elections because Gul's wife wears an Islamic-style headscarf.

    Secularists are opposed to the idea of a woman in Islamic attire occupying the presidential palace, long a secular symbol.Moreover, the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP)accused the AKP of turning the presidential elections into a "family business".

    "Such a practice has not been applied even in single party dictatorships...Not a respectable and honorable president but only a soldier loyal to your family can be elected by this method," the CHP's leader Deniz Baykal said on Monday.