Opinion For Iran,a suitable president

The recent rejection by the Guardian Council of the candidacies of both Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei,and the Iranian authorities’ decision to block “virtual private networks” could be seen as preventive moves in order to avoid the repetition of the popular outburst that occurred in response to what was believed by many inside Iran to be a rigged election in June 2009. Since 2009,Iranian ultra-conservatives close to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and Iran’s Revolutionary Guards have frequently attacked the Ahmadinejad-Mashaei group,several of whose allies have been either arrested or ousted from their government positions on the charge of witchcraft,sorcery and having links to the Mahdi,a descendant of Prophet Mohammed who,many Shiites believe,went into occultation centuries ago.

As for the other candidate,Rafsanjani — the former president of the Islamic Republic of Iran from 1989-1997,who also has been declared ineligible — represents the wealthy businessmen and the bazaar leaders who would like to find a solution to the Iranian nuclear issue so that the Iranian economy could be freed from the difficulties imposed by Western sanctions.

However,less than three weeks before Iran’s presidential election,the race to replace the populist and polarising president,Mahmoud Ahmadinejad,still promises to be unpredictable and full of surprises. With Rafsanjani and Mashaei out of the game,Iranian voters are left with eight approved candidates. The list includes three reformists — Mohammad Reza Aref,who was Mohammad Khatami’s first vice president; Hassan Rouhani,a former national security chief; and Mohammad Gharazi,a former minister during Rafsanjani’s presidency — and four candidates from the conservative faction close to the Supreme Leader: Ali Akbar Velayati,Khamenei’s foreign policy adviser; Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf,the current mayor of Tehran; Saeed Jalili,Iran’s current nuclear negotiator; and Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel,the former speaker of parliament,whose daughter is married to Khamenei’s son. The last candidate is Mohsen Rezaei,a centrist candidate and a former Revolutionary Guards commander who ran in the last presidential election in 2009.

Now that the candidates are declared,the main preoccupation of the Khamenei camp and the Revolutionary Guards is to help provide a high voter turnout. As such,with Rafsanjani and Mashaei out of the race,there will be no real anti-establishment votes,pressuring the conservatives to find a unity candidate. However,taking into consideration the numerous difficulties and challenges that lie ahead,in all likelihood,the ideal candidate will have to be an absolute loyalist to the Supreme Leader and on good terms with the Revolutionary Guards. Looking at these two criteria,it makes it extremely unlikely that the three reformists on the list will have a chance to win the presidential election. As for the candidates who have the greatest chance to be elected,first and foremost are the two closest to Ayatollah Khamenei — Gholam-Ali Hadad-Adel and Ali Akbar Velayati.

In case Velayati or Hadad-Adel becomes president,a solution to US-Iran relations might be easier to achieve than would have been the case under a contentious presidency of Mashaei or a reformist candidate who theoretically would not have been an underling of Ayatollah Khamenei. This said,the presidential election in Iran will also be centred on Iranian domestic issues,rather than being uniquely focused on relations with the United States. It is difficult to imagine that Iran can withstand the sanctions it is facing,which are breaking the backbone of the country’s economy,for much longer.

According to many analysts,the level of the crises that have followed the extensive oil and banking sanctions enacted against Iran last summer is not comparable to anything the country has faced since the end of the war with Iraq. Moreover,the budget provisioned for the current year’s oil revenues is expected to drop from 2.3 million barrels a day to 1.3 million,indicating a major drop in income for a regime whose 70 per cent of foreign exchange needs come from oil exports. The intense political infighting among different institutions of the Islamic Republic and the overall malaise that has drained a large segment of the Iranian population raise the question of the extent to which the presidential election in June will allow the transition of power to be a smooth one.

In truth,the events of the past years in Iran clearly demonstrate that while politics in Iran can be manipulated,it cannot be fully pre-ordained. It would,therefore,be wrong to dismiss the election scheduled for June 14 as a mere window-dressing process. It is almost certain that whoever manages to secure the presidency will have to deal with issues that matter most to the Iranians and to the world. That is why,during the course of the forthcoming weeks,the world will be watching the campaign for Iran’s election and its outcome. But we should not forget that over the last 35 years Iranian politics has created many surprises and it still has a whole lot of surprises for us.

The writer is Noor-York Chair in Islamic Studies,York University,Toronto