Ahmadinejad barred as Iran Guardians pick the candidates
TEHRAN: Former Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was barred from running in next month’s election Thursday while President Hassan Rouhani was among six candidates approved by Iran’s conservative-controlled Guardian Council, state media reported. The other candidates selected were hardliners Ebrahim Raisi and Mostafa Mirsalim, Tehran mayor Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, moderate Mostafa Hashemitaba and Rouhani’s ally and vice-president Eshaq Jahangiri.
Former hardline president Ahmadinejad, who ruled from 2005 to 2013, was barred along with his close ally Hamid Baghaie. Ahmadinejad shocked everyone by registering as a candidate last week against the advice of supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei-a move which many described as political suicide. More than 1,600 candidates registered to run in the May 19 election, but the Guardian Council only ever selects around half a dozen.
More than 130 women registered but none has ever been allowed to stand. “In Iran, it’s not only an election, it’s also a selection,” said Clement Therme, Iran research fellow for the International Institute for Strategic Studies.
Campaign starts now
Although campaigning was not due to start until April 28, the Guardian Council announced that it could begin immediately. Rouhani, a politically moderate cleric, has won praise since his landslide win in 2013 for taming inflation and reaching a groundbreaking nuclear deal with world powers that ended many sanctions. But disappointment over Iran’s continued economic stagnation is palpable on the streets, creating an opening for conservative opponents.
Unemployment is stuck at 12 percent, the promised billions in foreign investment have not materialized, and Rouhani has failed to release political prisoners, including reformist leaders under house arrest for their part in 2009 protests. “The problem has been the nature of Rouhani’s economic agenda. His administration has a discourse of social justice but they are ultimately neoliberal, and this has provoked disappointment,” said Therme. The aggressive stance of US President Donald Trump, who has slapped new sanctions on Iran and threatened to tear up the nuclear deal, has bolstered conservative claims that Rouhani’s outreach to the West has been misguided. —AFP