Saturday, October 8, 2011

Iran Parliamentary Elections Set for March 2012

The campaign season for Iran parliamentary elections will begin on 24 December when the candidates will have one week to register to compete for Majlis seats. The hopefuls, however, will be vetted by the government’s election supervisory body, the Guardian Council, which will release its own list of approved candidates to compete in polls, now scheduled to be held on 2 March 2012.

The 2012 elections for the new Majlis (the Ninth Majlis) are the first since the controversial June 2009 presidential race that gave rise to the Green Movement. It is not clear if the reformists would field any candidates for the upcoming elections. The leaders of the Greens, Mr. Mousavi and Ayatollah Karrubi, have been kept isolated and under house arrest for more than eight months. Many other movement activists are in prison or freed on bail, unable to run. It is not also clear if the Guardian Council would even allow members of the opposition who were not jailed to run for Majlis.

Ironically, the supporters of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, himself a beneficiary of the controversial 2009 elections, might themselves be vetted out of running for Majlis by the Guardian Council. They are branded “deviationists” by the conservatives who have called for the arrest of their political leader, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaie, Ahmadinejad’s chief of staff and son-in-law.

In some conservative circles, however, there are voices favoring tolerance towards the participation of a select group of reformist candidates. They fear a “one-party” election, conservative candidates running against other conservative candidates, would split their ranks and could lead to victories by the “deviationists,” if they were allowed to remain in race.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

What ever we say it will not make a difference to the Tavileh.

Anonymous said...

"Iran Parliamentary Elections Set for March 2012"

have the names of the winners been printed up yet?

Anonymous said...

anon 9:03...

I see u live in the US and talk about the Capitol.

(I doubt this will make the sansur here.. but as I know you are one of the insiders so.. screw it I write and toss it at ja anyway.)

Anonymous said...

Just a show for the world outside of Iran to see, nothing more.

We have become Syria.

Steve said...

The Iranian electoral system is quite strange. Candidates are elected democratically, but in before will be vetted very undemocratically by some cleric body, which is blocking all those candidates considered by him being too reformist.
I think, in effect this system is constantly weakening Iran, as it favors sycophants and hypocrites over original and inventive people.

Nader Uskowi said...

Lately, some of the readers of this blog, including one or two readers of this post, are filing personal comments addressed to this blogger. Because of their personal nature, they are not published here. They are encouraged to communicate with me through email that is available on this blog.

Anonymous said...

It's OK Mr Uskowi what do you expect from the regimes unethical behavior let alone their admirers.