Iran's main reformist coalition said Saturday it would take part in this month's presidential election only if at least one of its candidates was approved to run.
“The reformists will take part in the elections if we have candidates, but if not we cannot expect them to participate,” Reform Front spokesman Javad Emam was quoted as saying by the reformist newspaper Etemad.
The early presidential election, scheduled for June 28, is to choose a successor to ultra-conservative President Ebrahim Raisi, who died in a helicopter crash on May 19.
The 80 candidates who have declared their candidacy must wait until Thursday to see whether they are approved by the Guardian Council, a largely conservative unelected body that vets all candidates for public office.
Ahead of the March 1 parliamentary elections, the Reform Front said it would not take part in “meaningless, uncompetitive and ineffective elections” after a number of its candidates were disqualified.
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“The Guardian Council cannot nominate candidates from the reform movement,” Reform Front leader Azhar Mansouri told the local Fars news agency. “We have to field our own candidates.”
Reformers call for greater social freedoms and the establishment of a civil society.
The party released a list of three candidates: former First Vice President Eshagh Jahangiri, whose candidacy for the 2021 presidential election was annulled, and former ministers Abbas Akhundi and Massoud Pezeshkian.
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In the 2021 presidential election, the 12-member Guardian Council overruled many reformist and moderate candidates, handing conservative and ultra-conservative candidate Ebrahim Raisi an easy victory.
Limited options led many voters to avoid the 2021 election, which saw turnout of just under 49%, the lowest in a presidential election since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Unlike in many countries, the Iranian president is not head of state; the highest authority in the Islamic Republic is the supreme leader, a position held by 85-year-old Ayatollah Ali Khamenei for 35 years.
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