Iran’s thirteenth presidential elections will be held on June 18, and today marks the fifth and last day of registration for the presidential candidates.
Khamenei’s speech for Iran’s “future president”
In March, with the start of the Persian New Year, the regime’s Supreme Leader devoted the most important part of his Nowruz speech to Iran’s presidential elections. Ali Khamenei underlined the traits of Iran’s future president as someone who is “competent”, is a strong “believer” in the backward brand of Islam that Khamenei’s regime adheres to, and someone who is “revolutionary and jihadi”.
He said Iran did not need “an ironed out” president which can loosely be translated as a politically correct president. In other words, someone who would not mind getting his hands dirty with terrorism and aggression and someone who does not play by international rules.
The regime’s Supreme Leader also stressed that Iran’s future president should not be “a pessimist” or someone with a “dark view of the future”. This is an indirect jab at most officials in Iran, whether they admit it out loud or not, that the regime has no future in Iran.
Khamenei also made this clear during his Nowruz speech that the presidential elections must be “unipolar”. His only solution for keeping his regime together is unifying it, as well as increasing repression inside Iran.
Presidential candidates
On the first day of presidential registrations, 57 people registered to run. The final registered candidates have yet to be announced, but the prominent figures include Ebrahim Raisi, Iran’s current hardliner judiciary chief, Ali Larijani, former parliament speaker, and Mohsen Hashemi Rafsanjani, the eldest son of the late former Iranian President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani.
Former hardliner president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who was blocked in his attempt to run for the 2017 elections, also registered on May 12.
Ebrahim Raisi
Raisi is a 60-year-old, mid-ranking cleric in Iran’s Shi’ite Muslim establishment. He was appointed as Iran’s Chief Justice by Khamenei in March 2019 and considered a possible successor to Khamenei as the Supreme Leader. He lost to Rouhani in the 2017 presidential elections. Raisi is very close to Khamenei and is believed to be the Supreme Leader’s favorite candidate.
He is known to be especially brutal among political prisoners. In fact, during his inauguration speech as the new Chief Justice in 2019, he said the “security” of the regime was the Judiciary’s main priority. This was a direct attack against dissidents who are given long prison terms for “acting against national security”.
However, Raisi is most infamous for his involvement in the 1988 massacre of 30,000 political prisoners. He was a member of the three-member Death Commission in Tehran tasked with executing political prisoners who refused to abandon their beliefs. This came after a religious decree by the founder of the Islamic Republic, Ruhollah Khomeini, and thousands of political prisoners were executed in less than three months in the summer of 1988.
Ebrahim Raisi who was introduced into the regime’s suppressive institutions at the age of 18, was involved in the bloodiest massacre of dissidents in Iran’s recent history at the age of 28.
According to some of the prisoners who survived the executions, Raisi walked around in prison without his religious cloak and turban “seeing to” matters related to the executions.
Raisi won over Khomeini for his outstanding work in the mass executions and was placed in a special two-member committee tasked with issuing hand and leg amputations and other inhumane sentences, “free from administrative complications”.
Before taking over the Judiciary, Raisi was the custodian of the Imam Reza Charity Foundation, also known as the “Astan Quds Razavi Foundation”, a massive business corporation with a real-estate portfolio worth an estimated $20 billion, which effectively functions as a slush fund for Iran’s supreme leader.
On January 13, the US Treasury Department in the final days of the Trump administration, sanctioned the Astan Quds Razavi Foundation and 15 other institutions. According to AP, analysts estimate its worth at tens of billions of dollars as it owns almost half the land in Mashhad, Iran’s second-largest city. The charity was originally established to supposedly help the needy and “provide financial grants” to poverty-stricken citizens.
Ali Larijani
Ali Larijani’s registration and speech was broadcasted live on state TV. The former nuclear negotiator is a hardliner, former parliament speaker and advisor to Khamenei. The former IRGC commander was also appointed by the Supreme Leader as a liaison with China to finalize a controversial 25-year cooperation agreement between the two countries. The deal has been called “treacherous” by ordinary Iranians who believe the regime is selling Iran out to China.
Approval of candidates
After the registration of candidates which ends today, all candidates will be screened by the 12-member Guardian Council, affiliated with the Supreme Leader. They will be assessed for their political and Islamic qualifications. That means only those candidates who are completely dedicated to the Supreme Leader and his leadership and policies are going to be approved by the Guardian Council.
The Guardian Council has 12 members, six senior clerical members, who are directly appointed by Khamenei, and six jurists, nominated by the head of the judiciary, who is appointed by the Supreme Leader (Khamenei). Finally, the parliament, whose members must be certified and confirmed by the same jurists, vote for the Council members.
Iranians call for massive boycott of elections
During street protests in the past few weeks, many Iranians have called for a boycott of the mock elections because they know the true decision maker is Khamenei, the unelected Supreme Leader. Even polls on regime affiliated Telegram channels show most Iranians will not vote.
Apr. 25 – Karaj, #Iran
Pensioners protest their low pensions and express their economic grievances.
"We will no longer vote because we've heard too many lies!" they chant.
Iranians across the country are going to boycott the Jun.18 presidential elections. #IranProtests pic.twitter.com/BvCDoQMjuE— Iran News Wire (@IranNW) April 25, 2021
The Iranian regime is in its weakest state since the 1979 revolution that brought down the Shah. According to regime officials, more than 70 million people in Iran are dissatisfied with the current situation and want fundamental change in the ruling system.
Iranians who overthrew the Shah in hope of freedom and a better life are now facing oppression, poverty, misery, and rampant corruption, and they will stop at nothing to gain freedom and a better life.
Source » irannewswire