Polling stations opened their doors to Iranian voters today, Friday, to choose a new president for the country, to succeed the current President Hassan Rouhani, who called on voters to put aside differences and vote heavily.
The Ministry of Interior announced that more than 66,000 polling stations opened their doors to citizens this morning throughout the country, to participate in the presidential elections. Read also After the presidential race ends, will Iran’s external features change? What do Iranian youth expect from presidential candidates? How does the Iranian street view the presidential elections? Do electoral promises succeed in saving the Iranian economy?
Al-Jazeera
And competing in the presidential elections are 4 candidates from the conservative and moderate currents: the head of the Judicial Council, Ibrahim Raisi – who is described as the most fortunate – and the former director of the Central Bank, Abdel Nasser Hemmati, Mohsen Rezaei and Qazi Zada Hashemi.
About 59 million voters are entitled to participate in the poll, and the popular participation rate is the most prominent challenge in these elections, and voting continues until midnight local time.
The head of the Iranian judiciary and presidential candidate, Ibrahim Raisi, called on Iranians to participate in the presidential elections, even if they were upset with the current conditions in the country, as he described it.
Raisi added, in a statement after casting his vote in Shahr-e-Rei, south of Tehran, that he is committed to all his electoral promises, noting that not participating in the elections will not solve the country’s problems.
Celebration of our people
The Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei cast his vote as the polls opened in the Imam Khomeini Husseiniya in Tehran.
After casting his vote, Khamenei said, “I call on the Iranian people to participate in the presidential elections and decide the country’s future,” considering that the people will decide the fate of the country for the coming years through their participation.
Khamenei added that what the people decide today “will set the basic lines of their destiny for the coming years. It is wise for everyone to participate in deciding their own destiny, and I invite them to do so. Each vote in itself is important, and will affect your future, and we hope that this day will turn into a day of celebration for our people.”
For his part, President Rouhani urged Iranians to participate in the presidential elections, and said that “Iran’s enemies” want the turnout to be low, and asked his citizens not to allow this to happen.
He added, “If we have criticisms, we must put them aside now, and focus on participation. The failure of a certain party to perform its work as required should not prevent us from participating in the elections.”
Yesterday, Iran entered electoral silence after the end of the propaganda campaigns that extended for 3 weeks, and these elections come in light of an economic and social crisis caused mainly by US sanctions, and exacerbated by the Corona pandemic.