When polls open in Iran on Friday 5th July for the runoff election between a hardliner and a so-called ‘reformist’ candidate to become the next president, the only certain outcome is that the Iranian people will be the ultimate losers. Western media are already treating information on the election as if it was genuine, claiming that just over 40% of the 60 million eligible voters participated in the first round of the polls on 28 June. This was reported as a disastrously low turnout with many newspapers stating that it was “the lowest turnout in a presidential election since the 1979 revolution”. In fact, information from opposition sources inside Iran, who closely monitored thousands of polling stations, claim the real turnout was nearer 12%, meaning that 88% of voters boycotted the election, representing a complete rejection of the ruling theocracy.
The opposition sources estimated that optional and mandatory votes cast in 58,640 stationary and mobile polling stations amounted to less than 7.4 million, representing a mere 12% of eligible voters. Members of the Mojahedin-e Khalq (MEK) democratic Resistance Units stated that in some polling stations in Tehran, families of IRGC and Basij members were seen being bussed in to cast their votes. They seemed to be the only ones participating. In other polling stations no voters turned up at all. In Iran, it is an offence that can lead to a fine or other punishment to fail to vote, and voters must have their identity cards stamped in the polling station, so it is a courageous and deliberate form of defiance to boycott the elections.
It comes as a crushing defeat for the elderly and increasingly psychotic Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei who urged people to participate in the election, stating: “The survival of the Islamic Republic and its integrity, honour and reputation in the world depend on the presence of the people. High turnout is a definite necessity” Absurdly, the regime even decorated a van with pictures of Masoud Rajavi and Mrs Maryam Rajavi, the leaders of the opposition MEK, reminding those who boycotted the election that the MEK would be the only beneficiaries! The van toured extensively around Tehran on the eve of the elections. Such unwarranted publicity was unprecedented and welcomed by the MEK as a humiliating embarrassment for the mullahs.
Nevertheless, western media still fall into the trap of pretending that the runoff election is a genuine contest and that the ‘reformist’ candidate Masoud Pezeshkian, a heart surgeon and former health minister, is some kind of ‘moderate’. When Pezeshkian was asked on state-run TV what his policy would be if he won the election his reply was along the lines of “I do not have a policy. The Supreme Leader makes the policy, and my job would simply be to implement it.” That is democracy Iran-style! There is no doubt that Pezeshkian was only allowed to enter the presidential race in the guise of a ‘reformist’ in a vain attempt to increase voter turnout. It has backfired spectacularly.
69-year-old Pezeshkian allegedly won the first round of votes against the 58-year-old hardliner Saeed Jalili, the former nuclear negotiator, who notoriously repeatedly stalled international talks in Vienna to enable the clerical regime to accelerate its secret production of weapons grade uranium. Known for his slogan “no compromise, no surrender” to the West, Jalili vehemently opposed the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) nuclear deal, arguing it violated Iran’s “red lines” by allowing inspections of nuclear sites. He stands in sharp contrast to Pezeshkian who advocates the restoration of the defunct JCPOA deal and a lifting of economic sanctions.
Jalili is fiercely loyal to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, and it is almost certain that ballot boxes will be stuffed with fake ballots supporting him before the polls open on Friday, to ensure his coronation as the preferred successor to the ‘Butcher of Tehran’ Ebrahim Raisi, killed in a mysterious helicopter crash last month. Indeed, Khamenei has outlined his preference for a hardline president. Without mentioning Pezeshkian by name he said that any candidate who tried to satisfy the west would not be good for the country, in a clear reference to the so-called ‘reformist’ candidate’s determination to try to reopen nuclear negotiations with the US, UK and EU.
The Iranian people, led by the rebellious youth and the dynamic Resistance Units, have shown their scorn for the entire election circus, not only by withholding their votes, but by openly attacking election posters and fire-bombing Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) offices and paramilitary Basij compounds. Large banners and posters of Mrs Maryam Rajavi have been draped over motorway flyovers and anti-regime graffiti sprayed onto the walls of public buildings. Much of the graffiti bears the message: “Our vote is for Maryam Rajavi” or “Our vote is for regime change.”
So, the outcome of Friday’s vote will be derisory. Probably Jalili will be the winner, as the candidate most favoured by the Supreme Leader and most certain to continue his hardline policy of sponsoring international terror and proxy wars around the Middle East. Perhaps at that point western media may wake up and realise that talk of ‘reformists’ and ‘moderates’ in Iran is an illusion. There is no way the current tyrannical regime can change. The only way to restore freedom, justice, peace, democracy, and an end to the nuclear threat is to back the Iranian people in their desire to overthrow the mullahs and seek complete regime change.
Struan Stevenson is the Coordinator of the Campaign for Iran Change (CiC). He was a member of the European Parliament representing Scotland (1999-2014), president of the Parliament's Delegation for Relations with Iraq (2009-14) and chairman of the Friends of a Free Iran Intergroup (2004-14). He is an author and international lecturer on the Middle East.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member