By Girish Linganna
After a day of voting on June 28 with the lowest turnout ever for an Iranian presidential election, Iranians now have a choice between two candidates in the second and final round scheduled on July 5. One is a reformist who supports more interaction with the West and the other a hardliner who advises Iran’s supreme leader and is against making compromises.
According to the official results announced on Saturday, reformist candidate Masoud Pezeshkian received 43% of the votes, while conservative Saeed Jalili got 39%. Since neither candidate achieved more than half of the votes, there will be a final runoff on July 5. This is just the second time since the 1979 revolution that a presidential election in Iran has required a second round.
Iran’s Guardian Council, comprising 12 jurists and clerics, reduced the original list of 80 presidential candidates to six. They excluded seven women, a former president and several other government officials. Only four candidates remained in the fray. While supreme leader Ali Khamenei holds ultimate power regarding important state issues in Iran, the president is responsible for establishing domestic policies and holds the ability to affect foreign policies.
Masoud Pezeshkian, a cardiac surgeon and former member of Parliament and health minister in Iran, has captured the hearts of many voters due to his personal experiences. Having tragically lost his wife and child in a car accident, he admirably raised his remaining children as a single father and has chosen not to remarry. Additionally, his belonging to the Azeri community, one of Iran’s ethnic minorities, has further solidified his popularity among supporters.
Former President Mohammad Khatami has endorsed Dr Pezeshkian, who has also demonstrated his willingness to engage in nuclear negotiations with Western countries. He has cleverly framed the discussion around this topic as more of an economic matter.
Jalili, a staunch ultraconservative figure, earned the nickname ‘The Living Martyr’ as a result of losing a leg during the Iran-Iraq war. He is currently at the helm of the Right-wing Paydari party and staunchly upholds the most extreme ideological stances in both domestic and foreign policy matters in Iran.
According to Boroujerdi, an Iran expert and Dean of the College of Arts, Sciences, and Education at Missouri University of Science and Technology, who informed New York Times, Jalili’s assertion that Iran can achieve economic prosperity without negotiating with the United States is deemed “completely unrealistic”.
Although Jalili is considered the candidate most aligned with Khamenei, his portrayal of Iran’s economic capabilities to the public is viewed as overly optimistic and not grounded in reality. Boroujerdi stated that he was firmly against any nuclear deal or any form of engagement with the West.
Jalili, a senior member of the Supreme National Security Council, has pledged to reduce inflation to single digits and achieve an impressive 8% economic growth. He also plans to combat corruption and mismanagement. Additionally, he supports taking a tougher stance against the West and its allies.
According to the Interior Ministry, only 40% of the more than 61 million eligible Iranian voters participated in the presidential elections on Saturday (June 29), marking the lowest turnout since the 1979 revolution. According to the final tally from the election headquarters, Pezeshkian received over 10.41 million votes out of more than 24.5 million ballots cast, followed by Jalili, who garnered 9.47 million votes.
Conservative Speaker of Parliament Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who received 3.38 million votes and conservative Islamic leader Mostafa Pourmohammadi, who got 206,397 votes, were eliminated from the race. Additionally, Tehran mayor Alireza Zakani and government official Amir-Hossein Ghazizadeh Hashemi withdrew, leaving only four candidates in the presidential race. Ghalibaf, Zakani and Hashemi urged their supporters to vote for Jalili in the run-off election on Friday (July 5) to secure a win for the ‘revolution front’.
The snap election on Friday (June 28) was held within the 50-day period required by the constitution to choose a new president after Ebrahim Raisi and seven others, including Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian, died in a helicopter crash on May 19.
As in other major elections in the past four years, Friday’s (June 28), election saw a low turnout. However, the final participation rate was significantly lower than the 45%-53% predicted by polls.
The presidential election that brought Raisi into office had the lowest turnout in the over 40-year history of the Islamic Republic, with only 48.8% of voters participating. Previously, the parliamentary elections in March and May had the lowest turnout since the 1979 revolution, with just under 41% of eligible voters casting their ballots.
Calls for Change Grow Strident: Voter indifference is rising as many people feel discouraged after the deadly nationwide protests in 2022-’23. Additionally, the economy is struggling with over 40% inflation caused by mismanagement and US sanctions.
Hamid Reza Gholamzadeh, an Iranian foreign policy expert, told Al-Jazeera that the low turnout was due to the reformist camp’s failure to motivate its usual supporters, who typically increase voter participation. Despite being endorsed by prominent reformists, such as former presidents Mohammad Khatami and Hassan Rouhani, Pezeshkian could not rally the part of society that typically boosts turnout above 50%, which usually comes from reformist supporters, Gholamzadeh told Al-Jazeera, adding that it could be interpreted as people’s desire for change.
A higher turnout is expected in the July 5 run-off as it offers a clear choice between two opposing sides. This would likely benefit Pezeshkian, who needs more votes to overcome the combined strength of the conservative and hardliner camps.
Conservatives Criticize Pezeshkian: Jalili, who has been trying to become president for over a decade, blames Pezeshkian’s supporters for compromising Iran’s nuclear programme as part of the 2015 agreement. This deal was later abandoned by then US President Donald Trump in 2018. Accusing his opponent of inefficiency, conservatives claim a Pezeshkian victory would only mark a third administration of former centrist President Hassan Rouhani, according to Jalili. (IPA Service)
