President Hassan Rouhani and his main ally were the frontrunners on Saturday after one third of votes cast in Tehran in elections to Iran’s powerful Assembly of Experts were counted.
President Hassan Rouhani and his main ally were the frontrunners on Saturday after one third of votes cast in Tehran in elections to Iran’s powerful Assembly of Experts were counted.
Mr Rouhani and Ayatollah Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, a former President, had the most votes in the capital for the 88-member committee of clerics that appoints the country’s Supreme Leader.
In Tehran, voters are electing 16 members to the Assembly from 28 candidates.
With 1.5 million ballot papers counted out of 3.9 million cast, Mr Rafsanjani was in first place with 692,000 votes. Mr Rouhani was just behind with 652,000.
The figures were published by the semi-official ISNA news agency, citing the interior ministry which is responsible for managing Friday’s elections to the assembly and to Parliament.
In another significant development, three hardline conservative ayatollahs that the pro-Rouhani “List of Hope” had urged voters to avoid backing would keep their seats on the Assembly, according to the initial results.
Supporters of the List of Hope used social media to encourage voters to reject Ahmad Jannati, Mohammad Yazdi and Mohammad Taghi Mesbah-Yazdi. All three have adopted positions hostile to reformists.
The first results from Iran’s parliamentary election on Saturday showed a split of seats among conservatives, reformists and independent candidates, media reports said, after a turnout of around 60 per cent.
Coming just a month after sanctions were lifted under Iran’s nuclear deal with world powers, the outcome of Friday’s vote is being seen as a de-facto referendum on Mr Rouhani.
Early results, published by ISNA quoting electoral officials, suggested no one faction would win a majority. Out of 27 constituencies — less than 10 per cent of the total — eight went to conservatives, four to reformists and eight to independents, with others set to go to a second round because no candidate won 25 per cent of the vote.
The high number of independent winners could suggest a partial shift away from Iran’s sharply factional politics.
