The Islamic Republic of Iran has had three chief executives so far who began but did not finish their first term in office. Abolhasan Banisadr was elected in February of 1980 and remained in office barely a year and a half before Ruhollah Khomeini nodded his approval of Banisadr’s impeachment by the Majles. Mohammad-Ali Raja’i lasted less than a month, dying in a bomb blast in August 1981 that was the work of the Mujahedin-e Khalq. Ebrahim Ra’isi is the third, with his 19 May death leaving him a few months shy of three years in office. In keeping with the requirements of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic, Iranians will go to the polls on 28 June to elect a replacement for Ra’isi. Two questions on many people’s minds center around the candidates who will pass the Guardian Council’s filter so they can vie for the position, and what the voter turnout will be after the lowest-ever public participation in Islamic Republic elections in March for the Majles and the devastatingly low numbers for the subsequent runoff to fill vacant Majles seats.
After Ali Khamenei vacated his post as president to be elevated to the position of supreme leader in 1989, it took him a long time to finally find a president in Ra’isi who was absolutely obedient to him and compliant with his wishes, so the loss is a big one for him. Whoever follows is unlikely to show Khamenei the same deference that Ra’isi did, though several will certainly try to come close. For now, First Vice President Mohammad Mokhber-Dezfuli will be running the show, but at this point it is not clear whether his task will include anything more than setting the stage for the presidential vote. It is also not clear if Mokhber-Dezfuli himself has any designs on the office. If he does, he would have to resign as vice president before he could be eligible. What is clear, according to Guardian Council spokesman Hadi Tahan-Nazif, is a nugget of new information: the newly elected president will not be merely filling out Ra’isi’s uncompleted term; rather, he will begin a new four-year term as president, which renders moot the scheduled presidential vote in 2025. The economist Sa’id Leilaz, who often doubles as a political commentator, has made a cryptic remark about the political direction the Nezam is likely to take after Ra’isi’s death. “If I had a Twitter page,” he said, “I would tweet the following: this is a major step towards Bonapartism.” He offered no further explanation other than that he would elaborate later. In December of 2020, the Media Research Team at PersuMedia took note of Leilaz’s endorsement of Bonapartism, by which he seemed to mean a military man at the helm. Back then, reformist theoretician Sa’id Hajjarian opined this would bring the Islamic Republic one step closer to fascism.
MP Mohammad-Saleh Jowkar, the chairman of the councils and domestic affairs committee of the Majles, says there is no impediment to presidential aspirations for the heads of the two other government branches, meaning the Judiciary’s Gholamhosein Mohseni-Eje’i and Majles Speaker Mohammad-Baqer Qalibaf. Qalibaf, a former IRGC officer who has maintained ties with IRGC colleagues, has wanted the position since 2005, and given the uncertainty that he could remain in the role of speaker after his somewhat poor showing in the Majles vote, he might well be tempted to make the jump. Another prospect would be Tehran Mayor Alireza Zakani, who has displeased many, even in the conservative camp, with his corrupt and inefficient management of the capital. The journalist Saba Azarpeik is disturbed by activity on social media that suggests extreme hardliner Sa’id Jalili may throw his hat into the ring. Some have even floated the highly unlikely possibility that non-hardliners like Ali Larijani, Abdolnaser Hemmati, or Eshaq Jahangiri might be candidates—unlikely because Larijani and Jahangiri did not make it past the Guardian Council’s filter the last time around. Given the low voter turnout in the last few elections, conservative journalist Mohammad Mohajeri sees no possibility for any change in that trend unless the Nezam opens up to reformists, in which case the hardliners—those most eager to please the supreme leader—would almost certainly lose ground.
