http://news.ft.com/cms/s/0e355bfe-de94-11d9-92cd-00000e2511c8.html
Uncertainty surrounds Iran poll
By Gareth Smyth in Tehran
Published: June 16 2005 19:43 | Last updated: June 16 2005 19:43
Iran goes to the polls on Friday to elect a new president with unprecedented uncertainty over the result, as seven candidates chase 46.7m eligible voters in a race to replace Mohammad Khatami, the reformist leader standing down after two terms.
Campaign organisers said they expected the turnout to be higher than the 55 per cent predicted on Wednesday by Abdolvahed Musavi Lari, the interior minister.
Informal polls say the frontrunners are Mostafa Moein, a the main reformist, candidate, Mohammad-Baqer Qalibaf, the conservative former police chief, and Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, a former president.
But senior figures in all camps warned against relying on such polls.
“The Iranian people are about to do something to surprise the world, and in truth no one knows exactly what,” said Mostafa Tajzadeh, a senior official in Mosharekat, the reformist party backing Dr Moein.
An leading organiser for Mr Rafsanjani said he still expected victory, either in Friday’s vote or in a run-off ballot if no candidate gains 50 per cent of the vote in the first round.
But he conceded that “people previously in power, like [UK prime minister] Tony Blair, often face problems [winning votes]”.
Dr Moein’s camp was confident of outpolling both Mr Rafsanjani and Mohammad-Baqer Mr Qalibaf, who is running as a conservative moderniser.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if Mr Rafsanjani came third,” Mr Tajzadeh told the FT. “His campaign has certainly misfired. Sending young people out on the streets [with loud music and stickers] doesn’t work if everyone else just asks how much money they’ve been given.”
Dr Moein’s campaign began late, after Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, unexpectedly asked the Guardian Council, the Islamic watchdog, to reconsider a decision to disqualify him.
But it has gathered momentum, especially in targeted appeals to students and intellectuals, and to ethnic minorities - about who are around half Iran’s 68m population.
An organiser in Mr Qalibaf’s camp said on Thursday that Dr Moein, whose slogan has been “Iran for all Iranians”, had made inroads among Iran’s Sunni who make up 10-15 per cent of Iranians and include the Kurdish and the Baluchi ethnic minorities.
“This is a group whose votes can tip the balance,” he said. “When the Sunni leaders came to Mr Qalibaf and asked for specific promises, like seats in his government, he said no. But [Dr] Moein agreed.”
While Ayatollah Khamenei’s intervention enabled Dr Moein to run, the supreme leader has taken no visible steps to consolidate the “fundamentalist” camp, which is split between three candidates - Mr Qalibaf, Ali Larijani, former head of state broadcasting, and Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad, Tehran’s mayor.
Hossein Shariatmadari, the editor in chief of the conservative Kayhan newspaper, told the FT this week that fundamentalists should consider forming a political party to avoid such a split in future elections.
The conservative political machine that delivered victory in last year’s parliamentary poll is divided between four candidates, including Mr Rafsanjani.
In a move to foster unity, two senior clerics, Ayatollah Hossein Nouri Hamedani and Ayatollah Nasser Makarem Shirazi, on Thursday urged followers not to vote for someone who could not win.
“The ‘better’ candidate with more support is religiously prioritised,” said Ayatollah Shirazi.
Some reformists, meanwhile, have hailed the leader’s even-handedness as a big step forward from 1997, when Ayatollah Khamenei appeared to back Ali Akbar Nateq-Nuri against what became a landslide victory for Mr Khatami.
“Three months ago the CIA said the fundamentalists would win the election and the reformists were finished,” said Mr Tajzadeh.
“Instead, this is the beginning of the institutionalisation of democracy in Iran. We are seeing the fruits of [outgoing reformist president Mohammad] Khatami’s patience. His triumph is the acceptance that different ideas should be put forward in a peaceful way for the people to decide.”
