Ghalibaf among six approved to run in Iran’s presidential election
Al Jazeera
Parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf and five other conservatives approved to run in snap vote on June 28.
Tehran, Iran – Six people, including parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, have been approved to run for the snap presidential election on June 28 following the death of President Ebrahim Raisi in a helicopter crash.
The Guardian Council, a constitutional vetting body, approved former nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili and Tehran Mayor Alireza Zakani to run, but 74 others were not, marking another election with wide disqualification of candidates.
The 62-year-old Ghalibaf, a former commander of the air force of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), has been parliament speaker for four years, was the mayor of Tehran from 2005 to 2017, and the chief of police before that. He ran for president in 2005, 2013 and 2017, when he withdrew in favour of Raisi.
Jalili, who is Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s direct representative to the country’s Supreme National Security Council, withdrew from the 2021 election in favour of Raisi, who won virtually unchallenged.
Most prominent among those disqualified are Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the populist ex-president, as well as moderate candidate and former three-time parliament speaker Ali Larijani – both of whom did not qualify to run in 2021 as well.
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