The top electoral body of Iran has finally completed it's partial recount of the ballots cast in the June 12 presidential election. It confirmed President Ahmadinejad's re-election also demonstrating that there were no voting irregularities in the election process. Despite calls from the opposition and a large minority of voters for a total re-run of the presidential election the Guardian Council has made its final decision to swear in Ahmadinejad as the president of Iran. It is likely, despite clear voting irregularities that Ahmadinejad did actually win a majority of votes in the election.
After weeks of protests and 17 dead it raises questions. If the Guardian Council were to decide to re-run the presidential election, whether or not the first was free and fair, would such a landslide victory occur for Ahmadinejad in light of the government's treatment of the protesters? Do people who supported Ahmadinejad before the election still support him now? The president's opposition cites international condemnation of his foreign and internal policy as a huge issue and through the past 17 days Mr. Ahmadinejad has only invoked more tensions in already strained relations with the West.
Before this election, relations between Western nations and Iran seemed to be mending. It was beginning to look as though both sides were on speaking terms again. There was a flicker of hope as the United States extended a token 4th of July invitation to Iranian diplomats. Now it is all up in the air as the blame is thrown around.
If the election were to be run again, freely and fairly, would you expect similar results? A closer vote? Or a loss for Mr. Ahmadinejad?
2 comments:
I believe Ahmedinejad would still claim a victory, it would just be significantly closer. A 60% blowout was unexpected to begin with, and could only be attributed to rigging. After all, the opposition carries the majority of the youth vote.
You'd think if you rigged an election you'd do it by 1-2% (the George W Bush way : p) not by such a large margin. Then again it is possible to attribute those kind of numbers to a fair election. Jacob Zuma and the ANC got re-elected just short of the 66% majority they would have required to change the South African constitution.
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