Iran’s Rouhani secures more moderate parliament
TEHRAN: Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani secured his goal of a more moderate parliament Monday after elections saw hardliners soundly trumped by reformists and conservatives lose seats as voters implicitly backed the government.
Final results showed the vote being split three ways between Rouhani’s reformist and moderate allies, conservatives and independents, a result that gives the president more leverage to bring about domestic change.
No single group had a decisive share of parliament’s 290 seats from Friday’s voting, but tallies suggested the pragmatic Rouhani would be able to muster support from key backers and create a working majority.
The outcome signalled strong public support for last year’s nuclear deal between Iran and world powers, an agreement steered by Rouhani which saw the lifting of sanctions in January after years of economic hurt.
“Kudos to the history-making nation of Iran. Let’s open a new chapter based on domestic talents global opportunities,” the president wrote on Twitter soon after the last results were read out on state television.
Friday’s second election — for the clerical Assembly of Experts — also produced symbolic gains for Rouhani and his closest allies.
Two renowned hardline ayatollahs lost their seats on the 88-member assembly, a powerful committee that monitors supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s work and will pick the 76-yearold’s successor if he dies during its eight-year term.
In contrast, 15 of 16 candidates from the list for the assembly headed by Rouhani and his veteran political backer Ayatollah Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, a two-term former president, were resoundingly voted in.
Rafsanjani came first and Rouhani third. A push by their supporters, largely on social media, helped eject current assembly chair Mohammad Yazdi and the ultraconservative Mohammad Taghi Mesbah-Yazdi, formerly a close adviser to ex-president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, another hardliner.
The most dramatic change, however, was the resurgence of the reformists, a political camp largely silenced after a disputed election in 2009 saw Ahmadinejad re- elected. That vote was followed by bloody street protests in which dozens of people were killed in what is widely considered the Islamic republic’s darkest hour.
Reformists swept the capital, and in an electoral first did so without requiring a second round of voting in any of the 30 seats they secured.
After campaigning as the ‘List of Hope’, a slate of reformist politicians who support the government will regain significant power in parliament and are likely to push for social, cultural and political reforms. — AFP