Session Begins to Review Confidence Vote for Proposed Ministers of Hassan Rouhani in Parliament

The session to review the confidence vote for 17 proposed ministers of the twelfth cabinet of the Islamic Republic, led by Hassan Rouhani, began on the morning of August 15 in the Islamic Consultative Assembly. The list of proposed ministers does not include a Minister of Science. Hassan Rouhani, the President of Iran, has personally gone to the parliament to defend the proposed ministers. After Mr. Rouhani's speech regarding the cabinet and government program, the parliament will consider the government's program and the ministers. This speech can last a total of two hours and 30 minutes. After the speech, five representatives in favor and five representatives against the President's programs will speak for a total of two hours and 30 minutes. The 17 proposed ministers of the Iranian President also attended the parliamentary session on Tuesday morning. Previously, Behrouz Namati, the spokesman for the parliament's presiding board, stated that the review of the qualifications of the proposed ministers is expected to take 'three or four days.' Mr. Namati mentioned that the reviews will be conducted in three working sessions in the open parliament. Last week, Mr. Rouhani introduced his 17-member cabinet list to the tenth parliament, but the proposed Minister of Science, Research, and Technology was not named. Criticisms have been raised regarding the cabinet and the proposed list by Hassan Rouhani, including the lack of even one woman as a minister, the absence of Sunni citizens, and disregard for 'youthfulness.' Dozens of parliament representatives also sent a letter to Hassan Rouhani requesting that for transparency regarding the financial status of the proposed ministers, their asset lists be confidentially provided to parliament members. Criticisms have also been raised about the increased 'politicization' of government ministries by Masoud Pezeshkian, the Deputy Speaker of Parliament. On the other hand, Ali Motahari, another member of the Iranian parliament's presiding board, evaluated the proposed cabinet of the twelfth government as 'generally good' and stated that in his opinion, 'the presence of proposed ministers from both conservatives and reformists indicates the absence of factional and group bias in the cabinet.' Among the introduced ministers, there are eight new faces, including Mohammad Javad Azari Jahromi, Masoud Karbasian, Mohammad Bat'hai, Alireza Avayi, Amir Hatami, Mohammad Shariatmadari, Abbas Salehi, and Habibollah Bi-Taraf. According to the regulations of the Iranian parliament, two representatives in favor and two representatives against will speak about each proposed minister, after which the proposed individual will have half an hour to defend themselves. The review of each proposed minister's qualifications, based on the provided schedule, will take up to 90 minutes.