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30-06-2024
TEHRAN: Iran will hold a run-off election after hardline candidate Saeed Jalili and rival Massoud Pezeshkian, who is seen as reformist, both failed to secure a majority in the presidential race.
Candidates need to win 50% of the vote but the pair both hovered around the 40% mark with Pezeshkian finishing narrowly ahead.
Iran’s interior ministry confirmed the second round is set for 5 July.
Two security force members were killed after unidentified gunmen attacked a vehicle carrying election boxes in Sistan-Balochistan province, according to state media reports.
Former nuclear negotiator Jalili was trailing Pezeshkian, a former heart surgeon and health minister by about a million votes, early results from the interior ministry show.
Pezeshkian has promised a different approach, saying the actions of the morality police, who enforce strict dress codes on women, are “immoral”.
Although he is seen as a reformist, Pezeshkian is deeply loyal to Iran’s supreme leader.
Some commentators have suggested that should he be elected, Iran should not expect more than a difference in tone.
The vote is to replace former president Ebrahim Raisi, who died on 19 May when the helicopter he was in crashed into a mountain, with seven other people also killed.
Though there are 61.5 million eligible voters in Iran, only around 40% turned out to vote – the fewest since the 1979 Islamic revolution.
Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who is the ultimate authority in the country, had called for “maximum” turnout.
Iran was shaken by a huge wave of protests in 2022 following the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, who was detained by the morality police for allegedly violating Iran’s strict dress code.
Human rights groups say hundreds were killed in the crackdown and thousands detained.
Iranians are going to the polls on Friday to elect a new president, following the death in May of the former incumbent, Ebrahim Raisi.
However, the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is the person who really wields power in Iran.
What happens in the presidential election?
The first round of Iran’s presidential election takes place on 28 June. There are 61.5 million eligible voters in a population of almost 90 million.
There will be a run-off election on 5 July if no candidate wins more than 50% of the vote in the first round.
The vote is to replace the hardliner Raisi, who died on 19 May when the helicopter he was in crashed into a mountain in fog.
The presidential candidates were heavily vetted, and many major politicians were barred from the race. Only six people were allowed to run and two of those dropped out the day before the election.
The front-runners are two conservatives Saeed Jalili, a former international negotiator, and Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, the speaker of the parliament and a 69-year-old heart surgeon called Massoud Pezeshkian, who is the one reformist in the race. Pezeshkian opposes the Islamic Republic’s strict dress codes for women and wants to bring an end to Western sanctions on Iran by making a new deal over its nuclear program.
The supreme leader has called for a high turnout in the elections, but it is thought many voters will refuse to vote because they are disillusioned with the regime. (Int’l Monitoring Desk)
