Iranians veto reform challenge

2004-01-26 12:45

Tehran - Powerful Iranian hardliners have vetoed an emergency bill passed by reformists seeking to curb their power to screen candidates for parliamentary polls, officials said on Monday.

The conservative Guardians Council, a political oversight body which plunged Iran into a major political crisis after it barred thousands of mainly pro-reform candidates from contesting the February 20 elections, said it had found the bill contained "points contrary to religion and the constitution".

Iran's reformist-held parliament, or Majlis, voted on Sunday for an emergency reform of the electoral law aimed at overturning the Guardians' decision to blacklist 3 605 of 8 157 prospective candidates.

Those barred included some 80 sitting members of the Majlis and prominent leaders of the reform movement.

The Majlis Sunday backed amendments aimed at making it easier for candidates to stand, and preventing the Guardians Council from disqualifying sitting MPs unless they had been convicted of a criminal offence.

Under Iran's constitution, the 12-member Guardians Council has the power to screen all legislation to see if it complies with Islamic law and the constitution. A bastion of the religious right, it has also consistently blocked efforts by reformists to shake up the 25-year-old Islamic republic.

Dozens of reformist MPs, ministers, governors and even President Mohammad Khatami have threatened to resign en masse in protest at the disqualifications that could paralyse the new legislature, due to convene in June.

But the head of the Guardians Council, Ayatollah Ahmad Janati, also hit back at a statement from Khatami and the speaker of parliament, Mehdi Karubi, who have demanded a "full review" of the blacklist.

According to IRNA, Janati said that, with thousands of candidates not disqualified, there would be adequate competition for each of the 290 seats in the Majlis.

Khamenei moved to haul Iran out of one of its worst ever crises by ordering the council to be less stringent in its vetting procedure, but only some 300 of the rejected candidates have so far been reinstated, none of them sitting MPs.

The council, whose members are directly or indirectly appointed by Khamenei, has been accused of seeking to rig the polls in order to oust reformers.

Reformists contend that given the present level of disqualifications, they are certain to lose their control over the parliament - and therefore the government.

The Guardians Council, which has defended its vetting process and insisted it is only exercising the laws of the country, has until January 30 to certify the final list of candidates to the interior ministry.

That gives those finally approved only three weeks to pitch their views to an electorate already widely disillusioned, particularly voters who have supported Khatami and the reformists in the past.

- AFP