Kasra Arababi to Voice of America: Participation in the Second Round of Voting to Replace Raisi Will Also Be Very Low

As the second round of voting for government candidates to determine a successor to Ebrahim Raisi takes place on Friday, July 6, critics of the Islamic Republic say that the West should not interpret the uncertainty of the potential winner as a sign of democratic competition between two rival factions loyal to the Supreme Leader. In the voting on Friday, Saeed Jalili, the former nuclear negotiator of the Islamic Republic, faces off against Massoud Pezeshkian, a former health minister. According to statistics announced by the Islamic Republic, the participation rate in this voting was about 40 percent, and the majority of Iranian voters boycotted the first round. However, there are serious doubts about the accuracy of these figures. Many accuse the government of manipulating the results and inflating the votes received, claiming that the participation rate was much lower than reported. Based on these government statistics, Pezeshkian led with 44 percent of the votes in the first round but did not achieve more than 50 percent, leading to a second round between the top two candidates. The United States states that the elections in the Islamic Republic are neither free nor fair, as the government disqualifies candidates who are not sufficiently loyal to Ali Khamenei, the Supreme Leader. According to research by independent groups like the 'United Against a Nuclear Iran', the Islamic Republic also has a history of inflating participation figures to bolster its internal legitimacy. Kasra Arababi, the research director of this group regarding the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, in a recently published report, states that a hidden branch of the IRGC known as 'Baqiyatollah Headquarters' is one of the leading forces in electoral fraud in the presidential and parliamentary elections of the Islamic Republic. This report cites various sources, documents, and evidence obtained from the IRGC or government offices of the Islamic Republic. The Islamic Republic's representative office at the United Nations in New York responded to the report from the 'United Against a Nuclear Iran' by stating that the Guardian Council 'has confirmed the validity of the results of the first round of the presidential election in Iran.' Kasra Arababi, regarding the low participation of Iranians in the first round of voting to replace Ebrahim Raisi, which was unprecedented, tells Voice of America that a similar situation can be expected in the second round. He added, 'Despite Khamenei's significant efforts to increase political participation and revive the constructed dichotomy of hardliner-reformer between Jalili and Pezeshkian, Iranians are not accepting it. They no longer believe that the Islamic Republic can be reformed. They believe that Jalili and Pezeshkian are two sides of the same coin.' According to Kasra Arababi, despite the low participation inside the country, Khamenei has been relatively successful in creating the illusion of false competition for foreign audiences. He further stated that considering the coverage of Western media regarding the government voting in Iran, it can be said that Khamenei will be somewhat satisfied from this perspective. Kasra Arababi points out that power in the Islamic Republic is entirely in the hands of the Supreme Leader, the leadership office, and the IRGC, and he does not see the possibility of fundamental changes by Pezeshkian under the banner of reformism as 'realistic.' He notes that the former health minister of the Islamic Republic is by no means a reformist but has accepted the 'veneer of reformism.' Kasra Arababi states that all strategic policies of the Islamic Republic are determined by Ali Khamenei, and there is essentially no difference between Jalili and Pezeshkian; they are only superficially different. He recalls the popular slogan 'Reformer, Principlist, the story is over' and says that Iranians inside the country no longer accept these factions, which is why they are boycotting this voting process. Kasra Arababi mentions that outside of Iran, the illusion of a so-called reformist president could change Western policy towards the Islamic Republic or lead to a reduction in pressure on the regime. He states that perhaps Western countries would welcome this, but even in this case, there would be no change in the policies of the Islamic Republic because the Supreme Leader is the main decision-maker. He continues by saying that the Supreme Leader has made it clear that the regime is becoming more aggressive, ideological, and strategically reckless. This report utilized previous content from the English section of Voice of America and earlier materials from the Persian section.