Sepanta Niknam and the Death of the Rule of Law and Citizen Rights

The Islamic Republic is on the verge of its fortieth anniversary. In the early years of this regime, individuals had optimistic, pessimistic, or realistic doubts about its legal and actual nature, waiting to see which direction this system would take. Now, it is clear what a phenomenon that is the result of Stalinist leftism (the Tudeh Party), Islamism, which itself is a victim of the ideological and clerical (Shariati, Motahari, and Khomeini) thoughts, and shepherdism/fascism/anti-Western Orientalism (Al Ahmad, Fardid, and Shayegan) has reached in interaction with the outside world (the international community and domestic classes). All evidence indicates that this government is continually moving towards being more authoritarian and totalitarian in legal terms and becoming more security-military in its actual regime. The political and economic power of the Leader's Office and the IRGC, along with the interpretations of the Guardian Council from the beginning until today, aptly reflects this trend. The case of Sepanta Niknam is a clear example of the legal aspect that effectively ends the debates regarding the possibility of the rule of law and citizen rights in the Islamic Republic. Examples like Niknam's dismissal from the Yazd City Council are referred to as decisive judgments in epistemology. All principlist protesters, as they believe in the totalitarian foundations of the regime (the Islam that the Guardian Council protects and defines), have no criticism of the Guardian Council's opinion and thus want to surgically remove this disgrace with the knife of expediency. But what expediency? How can one argue for the presence of a minority of 20,000 people in national and local government positions in an 80 million population country based on expediency? The elimination of all minorities not only does not create a problem for the existing government but also helps its integrity and grants special privileges to its serious followers (like the defeated candidate in the Yazd City Council elections who wants to take Niknam's place). Tolerance and audacity. On the same days when Hassan Rouhani was boasting about the tolerance of Iranians in his UN speech (of course before the formation of the Islamic Republic and without regard to forty years of suppression of Baha'is, Jews, Evangelical Christians, and atheists) (September 20, 2017), the Administrative Justice Court was preparing a ruling to illegally restrict another right of religious minorities in Iran, namely candidacy for city councils and membership in these councils. Religious minorities had already been legally and practically deprived of membership in the military and IRGC, candidacy for the presidency, judicial positions, candidacy for the Assembly of Experts, and hundreds of councils and committees in the Islamic Republic. This ruling was based on the jurisprudential opinion of the Guardian Council. During the elections on the eve of the city council elections along with the presidential elections of 2017, the Secretary of the Guardian Council issued a directive prohibiting the presence of non-Muslim minorities in city councils, tightening the political participation of religious minorities. The Guardian Council, in a letter dated April 15, 2017, recognized Clause 1 of Article 26 of the 'Law on the Formation, Duties, and Elections of Islamic Councils and Mayors' approved in 1996 as contrary to Sharia principles. In this clause, believers in officially recognized divine religions in the Constitution are allowed to register for city and village councils. This prohibition directive is limited to areas where Muslims are in the majority, but (except for a few very small villages in Yazd province) in which city or village in Iran are Muslims not in the majority? Therefore, stating that minorities can be members of councils in areas where they have a majority is irrelevant and meaningless in most regions of the country. It remains to be seen how those who still believe in the impact of elections in Iran under the supervision of the Guardian Council justify their beliefs in light of such rulings. What expediency? The cancellation of Niknam's membership has created a deep rift among the ruling class in Iran to the extent that the Speaker of the Parliament, the Head of the Judiciary, and individuals like Tavakoli, Zarghami, and Mohsen Rezaei have expressed their dissatisfaction with the Guardian Council's opinion. This group, all of whom were religious-revolutionary youths of the 1970s and played a central role in the repressive regime and benefited from it, have realized what the Niknam issue means for the regime and, on the other hand, they had not yet fully understood the depth of the sectarianism of the Shia clerics. However, the story does not end with the cancellation of Niknam's membership and these expressions of opinion, as the Guardian Council has called for changes to the council law by the Parliament, and the Speaker of the Parliament has ordered changes to the law. Of course, all principlist protesters, as they believe in the totalitarian foundations of the regime (the Islam that the Guardian Council protects and defines), have no criticism of the Guardian Council's opinion and thus want to surgically remove this disgrace with the knife of expediency. But what expediency? How can one argue for the presence of a minority of 20,000 people in national and local government positions in an 80 million population country based on expediency? The elimination of all minorities not only does not create a problem for the existing government but also helps its integrity and grants special privileges to its serious followers (like the defeated candidate in the Yazd City Council elections who wants to take Niknam's place). It seems that even revolutionary youths like Zarghami, Tavakoli, and Larijani have not yet understood the governmental consequences of what they have done over four decades to gain and maintain power and are astonished by the clerics' behaviors. The consequences of the negation of the rule. The Guardian Council, by reinforcing the Administrative Justice Court's directive based on the rule of negation of the ruler (the non-Muslim's rule over Muslims by expanding the definition of rule to any public employment), has nullified two fundamental rights that are even considered in some principles of the Islamic Republic's Constitution—consciously or unconsciously: 1. Citizenship: Based on this ruling, the equal rights of citizenship and equality before the law are nullified. Citizen rights are meaningless for the Guardian Council, and within the framework of this council's interpretations, we have rights for Muslims and non-Muslims (previously this distinction was made for believers and non-believers with practical commitment to the Guardian Jurist). Despite the absolute dominance of clerics and the Guardianship of the Islamic Jurist in the realm of power, decision-making, and policy-making, the Constitution does not differentiate between classes, religions, and strata in the realm of political participation. In the Constitution, Christians are not supposed to vote only for Christians, and Jews only for Jews. In the Assembly of Experts, presidential, parliamentary, and council elections, so far, any individual could vote for any other individual who had passed the filters. One of the Parliament's solutions to resolve the Guardian Council's religious problem regarding minority participation is segregation. Mohammad Mahmoudi Shahneshin, a member of Parliament from Shahriar and Quds, talks about the details of changing the council law by a working group in the Council and Internal Affairs Committee of the Parliament to amend Clause 1 of Article 26 of the election law: 'In this plan, religious minorities will be obliged to vote only for their own candidates in any election they participate in.' (Tasnim, November 3) This action is the practical result of the Guardian Council's ruling and the Administrative Justice Court, which creates a multi-layered system among voters, something that had previously been done regarding voters. This segregation means second-class citizenship for religious minorities, something that Shia clerics have always believed in but have not had the opportunity to implement. According to existing jurisprudential teachings (jurisprudence taught in seminaries and not the jurisprudence that some Islamist critics of the current situation have in mind), it is impossible for a Shia cleric to believe in equal rights for all citizens and, in general, citizen rights for all subjects equally. The ideological foundations of clerics who promote political Islam and the Guardianship of the Islamic Jurist and determine the current processes and trends are no different from the governments of ISIS and the Taliban. The difference is in Iranian society, which has slowed down their Islamicization process and has protested at every stage, but the government has not retreated an inch from what it has facilitated for its implementation. Just look at the trends. Are the trends towards more freedom, democracy, and tolerance, or the opposite? 2. The Rule of Law. The Guardian Council's argument is not based on the rule of law but on the rule of religions. The problem with Niknam's presence in the Yazd City Council for the clerics of the Guardian Council is not the disruption of the rule of law but the disruption of the undisputed and totalitarian rule of Muslims who believe in political Islam. During Niknam's membership in the Yazd City Council in the previous four-year term, no instance of law violation was observed against him, laws that were all passed by Parliament and approved by the Guardian Council. The rule of law is fundamentally different from arbitrary, situational, and selective changes in laws. The tradition that the Guardian Council has established in recent years is to give situational opinions on approved laws and to make the supervisory oversight permanent (like the expulsion of Minoo Khalighi, the people's elected representative from Isfahan after she passed the filters). With such actions, legislation and legal oversight are fundamentally meaningless. The Guardian Council has not recognized Clause 1 of Article 26 of the election law as contrary to Sharia for 21 years, and this was done suddenly. Thus, all laws of the Islamic Republic are suspended until the Guardian Council does not violate them based on the request of someone they know and who has previously been in the Basij, and even after changes, there is no guarantee for their continuity. There is no guarantee that this council will not behave in this way with other approved laws. In principle, in the legal system of the Islamic Republic, a process called legislation is not meaningful, let alone the enforcement of laws or punishment of violators. The Guardian Council and other Shia clerics do not recognize or believe in a modern nation-state with citizen rights for its subjects and the rule of law. Next steps. The rule of negation of the ruler, according to the reading of the Guardian Council, limits the government (in the sense of any decision-making, policy-making, and legislation at any level and region) over the Iranian people solely to Shia believers in the Guardianship of the Islamic Jurist, one of the clear consequences of which will be the necessity to eliminate representatives of minorities in Parliament since they also have authority over Muslims based on this rule and can play a role in the approval or disapproval of a resolution in close voting conditions. Another consequence of such a reading for minorities is the implementation of the ruling of the impurity of minorities in the public sphere, something that is being executed in some cases (putting up signs declaring the religion of shopkeepers in food stores). If a few Muslims in the metro feel that water spilled from a non-Muslim's hand is impure and thus violated their authority over the public sphere, they can refer to the Guardian Council and demand the segregation of the place of Muslims and non-Muslims, just as has been done regarding women and men. Subsequently, the story will lead to wearing special clothing for each of the accepted minorities in the public sphere. Unaccepted minorities, who do not even have the right to have a cemetery, let alone a right in the public sphere of the living. Shia clerics, under the influence of public opinion in 1978 and 1979, conceded to matters that today, holding absolute power, they cannot tolerate and want to free themselves from their constraints. 'Pure Islam of Muhammad' as interpreted by Khomeini's disciples cannot be concealed under the conditions of expediency and consideration of public demands and requests. Four or forty years? The permanent Islamicization that clerics and the Supreme Leader have sought means gradually limiting the rights of the people as far as necessary. Until every single citizen prostrates before Khamenei like Basijis, the process of Islamicization will not stop. Even in that situation, Islamicization will continue until this prostration becomes eternal. Khamenei and his ideological companions are not satisfied with any limit of Islamicization and have always demanded more. The gradual nature of this process (unlike the hasty actions of ISIS and the Taliban) has been to avoid a strong reaction from social classes, individuals, and international institutions. The only difference between the Islamic Republic and ISIS is this gradual implementation of Sharia laws. There has been no behavior from the Taliban and ISIS that the Islamic Republic has not committed, but this has been done over a 40-year period, not four years, covertly and not overtly, and in coordination with the monstrous propaganda apparatus of the government and considering the threshold of public acceptance and international public opinion. European and American leftists, believing in cultural relativism and identity politics, have eased the government's concerns about global consensus against its policies. Islamicization will not stop. The ideological foundations of clerics who promote political Islam and the Guardianship of the Islamic Jurist and determine the current processes and trends are no different from the governments of ISIS and the Taliban. The difference is in Iranian society, which has slowed down their Islamicization process and has protested at every stage, but the government has not retreated an inch from what it has facilitated for its implementation. Just look at the trends. Are the trends towards more freedom, democracy, and tolerance, or the opposite? Both in the realm of issuing rulings and determining policies and in the realm of action, what the government is 'really' pursuing is the same as the governance of ISIS and the Taliban, and its opposition to ISIS is merely a matter of competition between Shia Islamism and Sunni Islamism in the realm of influence and power, not in the nature of views and policies. The fact that the current conditions of the country still do not satisfy Khamenei and his loyalists and Shia clerics is due to popular resistance against the complete Mosulization and Raqqaization of Tehran, but Shia clerics and their guardians are patiently waiting for the opportunity to eliminate laws and processes that do not align with ISIS-like Islam.