Six presidential candidates with the crowd at the funeral of Ebrahim Raisi in the background. Collage using photos from Deutsche Welle. – Photo: 2024
By Ramesh Jaura
BERLIN | 10 June 2024 (IDN) — Iran is preparing for new presidential elections to choose a successor to Ebrahim Raisi, who was killed in a helicopter crash on May 19. The Iranian Ministry of Interior has published the final list of candidates for the presidential elections scheduled for June 28.
According to the Iranian Interior Ministry, 287 people have officially declared their intention to run for president. Eighty people, including four women, had registered as candidates but were reportedly expelled by the Guardian Council.
The council, a powerful constitutional body made up of six clerics and six jurists, selected the six candidates after scrutinizing both their professional qualifications and ideological loyalty to the Islamic republic, Germany's state-run international broadcaster Deutsche Welle news site reported.
The council excluded a number of familiar faces from the election, including former president and populist Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and former parliament speaker Ali Larijani, a conservative seen as an ally of former President Hassan Rouhani.
Six presidential candidates
One of the six candidates is the Speaker of the National Assembly. Mohammed Bagher QalibafThe 62-year-old had long aspired to become president. He ran unsuccessfully in 2005 and 2013, before giving up in 2017 in favor of ultra-conservative Raisi.
Qalibaf, a self-described “fighter of the Islamic Revolution,” served as a general in the Revolutionary Guard and head of the national police. In 2003, he led a violent crackdown on student protesters. He served as mayor of Tehran, Iran's capital, from 2005 to 2017.
The second on the list is Said DjaliliJalili is considered a darling of the ultra-conservative faction within the Iranian regime. The 58-year-old served as Iran's chief negotiator in international talks on Iran's nuclear program. The hardliner now sits on the Expediency Council, appointed by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to resolve the conflict between parliament and the Guardian Council.
Jalili also ran for president in 2013, but gave up his candidacy in 2017 and voted for Raisi instead.
His occupation is doctor, Amir-Hossein Ghazizadeh Hashemi The third candidate. He served as Raisi's vice president and is currently Martyrs and Veterans Affairs FoundationHe was cleared to run in the 2021 presidential election. He received about 3% of the vote, placing fourth out of seven candidates.
Massoud PezechkianThe former health minister is the fourth candidate and is seen as more moderate than his rivals in the presidential race. The 69-year-old Afghanistan president tried to run in the 2021 presidential election but was disqualified by the Guardian Council.
Having Pezeshkian run in the 2024 election is seen as a government strategy to mobilize more liberal voters and increase turnout, but his chances of winning remain slim.
The fifth candidate, Mostafa Pour Mohammadi, He is the only Islamic cleric running for president this year. The 64-year-old served as interior minister under Ahmadinejad from 2005 to 2008 and as justice minister from 2013 to 2017. He served as a prosecutor in the revolutionary court in the 1980s and later as deputy minister of intelligence, where he is accused of being involved in mass executions of political prisoners.
Another hardliner, current Tehran mayor Alireza Zakhani, 58, is the sixth presidential candidate. The Guardian Council rejected his candidacy in 2013 and 2017. He ran in 2021 but lost his support to Raisi.
Other factors
Supreme power remains in the hands of Ayatollah Khamenei and senior clerics, and all six candidates rely on the support of influential elements within the regime leadership.
The late Ebrahim Raisi was the son-in-law of Ahmad Alam al-Khoda, Khamenei's representative in Khorasan Razavi province and a leading hardliner. Al-Khoda was also a preacher in Mashhad, the most important religious pilgrimage city in northeastern Iran, and a member of the Assembly of Experts, which appoints the supreme leader.
Having friends at the top of the government can help garner support from conservative and religious voters. Until now, successful reform candidates have needed to mobilize other segments of Iranian society and ensure high voter turnout, but in recent years many voters have been frustrated by unfulfilled promises.
In the March 2024 parliamentary elections, just 41% of voters showed up to polling stations, while turnout in the 2021 presidential election was just 48.8%, the lowest of any presidential election in the Islamic Republic's history. [IDN-InDepthNews]
*This article is based on a report by Shabnam von Hein published on the Deutsche Welle news website and was translated from German by Darko Janjevic.
Photo: The six presidential candidates with the crowd at Ebrahim Raisi's funeral in the background. Collage using photos from Deutsche Welle.
