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June 29, 2005 |
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Ahmadinejad was a founder of the group of young activists who swarmed over the embassy wall and held the diplomats and embassy workers hostage for 444 days.
Somewhere in the BBC archives is the interview I recorded with him and his colleagues, long after the siege was over. They all seemed rather similar - quiet, polite, but with a burning zeal.
And now, contrary to almost every expectation except his own, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has been elected president.
?Complete control
He is the first non-cleric to hold the job since Ayatollah Khomeini died in 1989, yet he is much more fundamentalist than either of the religious figures who have been in office since then.
Abroad, the Americans were the least surprised by the result. They assume anyway that Iran is a country seething with hatred for the US and determined to dominate the region by threat and undercover terrorism.
The British, French and Germans were the most taken aback, because they had previously argued that the Iranian government was basically pretty moderate and wanted to reach an accommodation with the West.
So now it seems as though the conservatives control not simply Iran's basic religious and political structure through the supreme religious leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, but also the government itself.
The gridlock between conservatives and reformers which has dominated Iranian politics since 1989 has finally been resolved.
Iran's rulers are now at one in their Islamic fundamentalism.
Firm believer
But is this really true? I somehow doubt it. Politics are far more fractured in Iran than in most Western countries, and expressions like "the conservatives" or "the reformists" have much less practical meaning in the Iranian Majlis than they would in Congress, the Commons, the Reichstag or the Chambre des Deputes.
Many Abadgaran members are like him: under 50, often from working-class backgrounds, intense, strong believers still in Ayatollah Khomeini's revolution of 1978-9. They even dress alike, with their dark suits, their beards, their open-necked shirts. The differences with the establishment figures who support Ayatollah Khamenei are considerable.
There is nothing working-class about them; and (unless I am reading it very wrong) Ahmadinejad's huge success in getting out the vote in the slums of south Tehran and elsewhere will have unsettled them.
The Khomeini revolution, back in 1978 and 1979, claimed to be acting in the interests of the poor against the wealthy and corrupt.
Still, the class divisions in Iran are as strong as ever. Few poor people have made it to the top in Iran - until now, that is.
Social tension Iranian politics are as complex and sophisticated as any I have observed around the world.
President Khatami, who wanted to open the country more to the West, never could. The gridlock always stopped him. President Ahmadinejad will certainly move in the opposite direction.
If his followers harass people in the streets, attacking men who shave and women who show their hair, wear make-up and bright colours, there will be much greater social tension and the possibility of future violence.
The implications of this will be worrying to the religious leadership. It is the better-off in Iran who usually want to follow Western styles. And although Ayatollah Khamenei is a religious conservative, he will not want class warfare breaking out in the streets.
So although President Ahmadinejad won a sizeable majority last Friday, he will not necessarily be able to do what he wants.
By John Simpson |
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June 26, 2005 |
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Shock as Iran elects hardline president
A man whose name does not even appear in the most recent edition of Iran's political Who's Who
Robert Tait, Tehran Sunday June 26, 2005 The Observer
His admirers hail him as Iran's Robin Hood, his critics a religious extremist. But yesterday Mahmoud Ahmadinejad became the president elect of Iran, basking in an electoral landslide few had foreseen and which put Islamic hardliners firmly in control.
After eight years of cautious liberalisation under Mohammed Khatami, Iranians now face an era of austere Islamist leadership. Ahmadinejad is supported by the basij, a volunteer grassroots militia that acts as a vigilante force ensuring religious laws are observed.
'Cut the hands off the mafias'
Reformers have labelled his rise as a 'fascist' militarist coup, but it was clear yesterday that his pledge to help Iran's poor and crack down on rampant corruption had resonated with many. During the campaign, he vowed to 'cut the hands off the mafias' he says are in charge of the country's oil industry and redistribute the revenues.
Equally important was the active support of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei - the real centre of power in the Islamic republic. That resulted in a mass vote mobilisation exercise spearheaded by basij leaders from mosques across the country.
'Ahmadinejad's vote comes from two sections of the electorate,' one Tehran-based analyst said. 'The first are genuine hard-core religious voters who rallied behind him when they realised that certain people were supporting him in the Revolutionary Guards.
'The second part belonged to the forces of tradition. These are people who have difficulties coping with the changes in society. They want somebody who appears modest and honest.'
It all amounts to a meteoric rise for a man whose name does not even appear in the most recent edition of Iran's political Who's Who.
He became governor of the north-western province of Ardebil in the 1990s, but was still a political novice when elected mayor of Tehran. In that role, he used his PhD in traffic and transportation engineering to bring order to the city's chaotic road network. He lived in a modest house, in contrast to the conspicuous lifestyles enjoyed by other senior regime figures.
'The country's true problem is employment and housing, not what to wear.'
But the mostly secular better-off fear his presidency may herald a clampdown on already limited social freedoms, such as the mingling of the sexes and the right of women to wear hijab in a looser, more colourful style.
Ahmadinejad has dismissed such concerns, saying: 'The country's true problem is employment and housing, not what to wear.'
His campaign advisers insist Khatami's modest reforms will not be reversed and that private behaviour will not be regulated.
'We will never stop or prevent any movement which has taken Iran forward and we will never move back,' his media spokesman, Dr Nader Shariatmadari, said. 'We respect people's freedoms in the political, cultural and social realms within the framework of the law.' |
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