The Triad Coordinates of Ayatollah Khamenei's Desired Elections

With Ayatollah Khamenei's announcement of opposition to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's candidacy in the 2017 presidential election, the next presidential election has effectively begun, differing this time in that Khamenei's intervention has led to the elimination of a potential candidate. Thus, the most significant manifestation of Khamenei's overt interference can be considered the role he boldly assumes to shape the 'electoral landscape' for the next election, contrary to the law. This note does not aim to elucidate the illegal aspects of Khamenei's interference in violating a citizen's right (in the recent case of Ahmadinejad), but rather to question what Khamenei's 'coordinates of a good election' are if he is willing to intervene so boldly in shaping the electoral landscape. The importance of this question lies in the fact that if we know Khamenei's desired election coordinates, we can accurately assess how far Iran's elections are from a globally standard election. This assessment is crucial because Khamenei claims that 'our elections are among the best and cleanest according to international standards.' Below, we will address three coordinates of a good election from Khamenei's perspective. First: Opposition to Early Election Campaigns. A review of Khamenei's behavior in most previous presidential elections shows that he is not keen on heating up the electoral atmosphere too early. For instance, with nearly eight months remaining until the next presidential election, no one, not even Hassan Rouhani, has officially announced their candidacy. The only person who had informally indicated his intention to run through provincial trips was Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who was subsequently eliminated due to Khamenei's opposition. It is worth recalling that about eight months before the June 2013 election, when Hashemi Rafsanjani's candidacy was being discussed, Khamenei expressed his dissatisfaction with the early heating of the electoral atmosphere on October 19, 2013. He completely rejected the early entry of some into the electoral arena, stating: 'The election is not close [!] but some [?] are entering this arena from now, which we do not approve of because everything should be done in its place and at its time.' While, eight months before the 2013 presidential election, the names of candidates (let alone their programs) were still unclear, it is useful to compare Khamenei's desired elections with the U.S. electoral campaigns, which have been ongoing for nearly a year and a half, where candidates from various parties have announced their candidacies since February 2015 and heated the electoral atmosphere. These candidates have engaged in hundreds of hours of intra-party campaigning, leading to Donald Trump from the Republican Party and Hillary Clinton from the Democratic Party facing each other. In the process of eliminating other candidates, there has never been an institution like the Guardian Council to disqualify a candidate of Hashemi Rafsanjani's stature. It is only the people's voting that removes a candidate from the scene and promotes another. Interestingly, while the names of candidates are still unknown eight months before the 2013 election, in the U.S., not only the main candidate but also their vice-presidential candidate is already determined. Incidentally, in the candidates' debates, there are also debates dedicated to their vice-presidents, allowing voters to scrutinize the viewpoints of a candidate and their running mate. Second: The Guardian Council's Right of Oversight. Typically, six months before the presidential elections in Iran, candidates step into the electoral arena; however, no candidate knows whether they will pass the Guardian Council's filter one month before the election. Although this note does not aim to evaluate the destructive performance of the Guardian Council in the electoral process, it is sufficient to mention that someone like Seyyed Reza Zawarei (a legal member and deputy secretary of the Guardian Council) was disqualified in the 2005 election by the same Guardian Council of which he was a member. Interestingly, Zawarei was one of the four candidates approved in the 1997 presidential election alongside Khatami, Nateq Nouri, and Rikhtehri. After his disqualification in 2005, Zawarei wrote a letter to Ahmad Jannati arguing that 'in 1997 the Guardian Council approved my candidacy for the presidency. Therefore, the action that led to my disqualification this time [2005] must have occurred after 1997. If so, I should not have been elected as the deputy secretary of the council in 2002 for another year.' Interestingly, Iranian media referred to this decision by the Guardian Council to disqualify its former member as 'a historical disqualification' until in 2013, once again, the qualifications of the former president and current head of the Expediency Discernment Council were rejected. However, it is astonishing that despite all the injustices the Guardian Council has inflicted in disqualifying thousands of candidates, Khamenei considers the Guardian Council's opinion as one of the manifestations of 'rational and logical rights and the rights of the people.' He has stated that 'one of the blessings of the Guardian Council is that it monitors errors and mistakes... The Guardian Council is the watchful eye of the system in elections. Such a thing exists everywhere in the world (!) now its name is something else. If they see a shortcoming and a person who is not qualified has entered, they stop him. This is their legal right. Their rational and logical right... Part of the people's rights is this right of the Guardian Council's vote. The supervisory right of the Guardian Council is part of the people's rights.' Third: Elections Without Parties. It is almost unheard of for Khamenei to mention the role of parties in the electoral process. Parties are the most effective influential current in the electoral processes of advanced political systems. However, does anyone remember the last time Khamenei spoke with parties? Has he ever met with the leaders of active parties in Iran (even though they are lifeless) among the thousands of meetings he has held with various groups? Khamenei's desired elections are those in which parties have no role whatsoever. In contrast, there is clear evidence that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), Khamenei's military arm, has repeatedly played an effective role in the electoral process without ever being reprimanded or admonished by Khamenei. Not only is he not in favor of the role of parties, but he also supports the IRGC's role in influencing and engineering elections. For example, Ali Saidi, the representative of the Supreme Leader in the IRGC, went so far as to state that 'the rational and logical engineering of elections is the inherent duty of the IRGC.' General Ramadan Sharif, the IRGC's public relations officer, also stated that: 'The IRGC has always pursued the clarification and presentation of the criteria and indicators of the best candidate in the electoral arena as a revolutionary mission and a religious duty.' The topic of election engineering raised by Khamenei's representative sparked such fierce criticism against the IRGC's role that Major General Firouzabadi, the then Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces, sought to cover up this major gaffe by saying: 'His intention [Hojjatoleslam Saidi] was not to enter the discussion of interference or even clarification, but to indicate that ideological and political organizations and representatives of the Supreme Leader in the armed forces have the duty to remind that the armed forces should not intervene in electoral orientations, which is the same as engineering elections.' Conclusion. Although more than these three points can be listed regarding Khamenei's desired election coordinates, even with these three points, we can monitor the 2017 election from now and see when candidates are identified, which of them pass the Guardian Council's filter, and how the IRGC's role in the electoral process unfolds. With this brief assessment, one can then evaluate Khamenei's claim that the elections of the Islamic Republic align with international standards and are among the best and cleanest elections.