Iran's Conservatives Fear Losing Upcoming Elections
An influential commentator in Iran says the weak performance of President Ebrahim Raisi's administration has seriously terrified his conservative allies.
An influential commentator in Iran says the weak performance of President Ebrahim Raisi's administration has seriously terrified his conservative allies.
Mohammad Mohajeri, a conservative himself and former editor of hard-line daily Kayhan, has said in an interview that conservatives believe the current government has left such a bad record that its opponents are highly likely to win the next parliamentary and presidential elections.
"However, their fear may be baseless as the supporter of reformists and a large part of Iranian voters are not willing to take part in the elections," Mohajeri said, adding that nonetheless, conservatives will continue their smear campaign against relative moderates such as former President Hassan Rouhani, former Majles Speakers Ali Larijani and Ali Akbar Nateq Nouri.
Meanwhile, Mohajeri said in another interview that Iran's reformists and conservatives have influence only among 15 to 20 percent of the society. He also charged that 90 percent of Iran's Friday Prayer Imams belong to the conservative camp and the Friday Prayers are a podium for only one political faction.
However, a national reconciliation is possible in Iran only if the government facilitates the political participation of all political groups in the elections. He added that there is not much time for that as fierce campaigning for the parliamentary elections will start in around two months from now.
He suggested that to facilitate political participation, the government needs to bring about essential changes in economic, political and cultural arenas. He argued that the government's inability to improve the economy will keep deeply disillusioned voters away from the ballot box.
Many people are also currently annoyed by the government's unilateralism. Enforcing compulsory hijab and filtering the Internet have deeply annoyed the people so that they are reluctant to take part in political activities such as voting in the elections.
However, Mohajeri said in the interview that some ultraconservatives including those around the housing minister Mehrdad Bazrpash have already started their campaign.
Mohajeri warned that if the government does anything beyond what has been stipulated in the Constitutional Law, the people will feel their essential rights have been undermined.
Many protesters during the past months chanted slogans against Iran's rigid Constitution which gives every right to hardliner clerics to restrict the freedom of the populace.
Meanwhile, he lashed out at the government's heavy-handed approach against unveiled women and said that it was quite clear from the start that policies such as launching a morality police would face resistance by women.
Agreeing with Mohajeri on the situation of the current government, Sharyar Heidari, a member of parliament told Rouydad24 website in Tehran that in the next election Raisi is not likely to win a quarter of the votes he received in 2021.
In another development, Iranian sociologist Nematollah Fazeli said in an interview with Khabar Online that the government does not have a true understanding of the people's demands. Fazeli said the government would have been at ease to accept some of the demands of the people if they were simply about the economy. But the people's understanding of politics and the gender issue has changed over the years and the government cannot understand that.
"Women had a focal position in the recent movement in Iran although there were other activists too. This is caused by a major development in social knowledge in Iran," he said, which “emanates from within the society and its everyday life and the people's collective experience."
Fazeli added that the understanding what happened in Iran during the past months requires a thorough understanding of women's role, but little attention has been paid to this matter by any government entity. This requires a new look at women and femininity, an issue that has been marginalized after the 1979 Islamic revolution, the sociologist said.
Ahmad Alirezabeigi, an MP representing Tabriz, revealed on Wednesday that the Industry Ministry gave at least 70 SUVs to parliamentarians to annul the motion against the Minister of Industry, Mines and Trade, Reza Fatemi Amin, about five months ago, when he was on the brink of an imminent impeachment.
The issue has been raised now Amin is facing another wave of criticism and is about to be impeached again, with several MPs asking questions about the SUV scandal. It is the first time corruption has been so openly addressed in spite of it being a historic trend in the regime.
Alirezabeigi called it a “tradition in the parliament” whenever the issue of impeachment is brought up. “Some people gain privileges on various excuses to compromise and undermine the supervisory duty of the parliament.”
The lawmaker also dismissed claims by other colleagues that Khamenei's recent statement about putting an end to disputes between the three powers of the government meant that he had ordered the Majles to stop the impeachment of the industry minister. Along with other MPs, Alirezabeigi is determined that the impeachment will move forward, accusing the minister of unethical policies including raising car prices.
In a bold statement, he said: “Fatemi Amin has given 75 Chinese SUVs to the representatives as a gift, of course I do not have any documents at the moment, but documents are available in the Article 90 Committee and the case is under investigation,” adding that the cars were Bahman Fidelity Prime, a 7-seater mid-size crossover produced by Jetour, and Bahman Dignity Prime, a mid-size crossover produced by the Chinese automaker Dongfeng Motor.
Offering valuable background on the case, Ahmad Rasoulinejad, another leading lawmaker, said that until the last night before the session to discuss the impeachment in December 2022, more than 60 percent of MPs were in favor of the motion but at the last moment it was announced there were not enough votes to go ahead with the impeachment, the government announcing only 85 in favor and 185 against. Rasoulinejad said: “I consider that day a dark day in the history of the parliament.”
Article 90 Committee of the Constitution, tasked with dealing with public complaints about the work of the three branches – namely executive run by Raisi, judiciary run by Ejei, and legislature run by Speaker Bagher Ghalibaf – denied the existence of such a case.
The Majles (parliament) began to warn President Ebrahim Raisi about the weak performance of his economic team including the ministers of industry (Reza Fatemi Amin), labor (Hojjat Abdolmaleki) and economy (Ehsan Khandouzi), two months after Raisi took office in August 2021.
Since then, Raisi has said repeatedly that he is planning a reshuffle but has not done anything yet. He had promised both during his election campaign and in the following months that he was adamant to improve the critical economic situation of ordinary people. In the meantime, lawmakers have renewed their calls for impeachments almost every month.
The lawmakers' heightened attacks on the government might be a tactic by the members of the parliament to distance themselves from the inefficient government during their last year in the Majles, in a bid to increase the chance of their re-election.
On Thursday, several government and parliament officials denied the claims, with calls for legal action against the "slanderers." Prominent hardline lawmaker Nezamoddin Mousavi, the parliament’s presidium spokesperson, said Thursday that the parliament has investigated the claims and they are not true.
Amin wrote to the head of the judiciary, Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei, urging immediate punishment. The letter, published Thursday, said: “Considering the damage of such statements to the public trust and the weakening of the country's social capital, please order that this issue be investigated as soon as possible, and legal measures be taken to prosecute the wrongdoers.”