“I have no plans for this matter,” he told reporters Sunday when asked about his anticipated candidacy.
It was not a Shermanesque proclamation of refusal, leaving room for him to change his mind in the coming months. However, if he really has an interest in running, his dismissal Sunday was not helpful as it will only encourage other conservatives who might have supported him to throw their own hats in the ring. In fact, it is very likely to set off a footrace in the conservative camp.
An aide to Tehran Mayor Mohammad-Baqer Qalibaf announced a few weeks ago that Qalibaf would run—but Qalibaf’s office said any announcement about the mayor’s presidential plans would come from the mayor himself and not from an aide.
Both Larijani and Qalibaf ran in the 2005 elections and neither fared well.
The conservative camp has been surprisingly quiet thus far, with little public comment or speculation on candidates. Larijani’s withdrawal might change that.
There has been lots of activity, however, among reformists, where there is widespread feeling that they must run a candidate next year and not boycott the elections as they did in this year’s Majlis balloting.
Numerous names have been bruited about. Former President Mohammad Khatami cautioned Friday that all the names are speculation at this point as no one has announced a desire to run and no parties have held any meetings to consider a candidate.
Khatami said his interest was in seeing a lot of discussion ending with a consensus behind a single candidate. There has been speculation that the establishment might approve one or two conservative candidates but a half dozen reformists in an effort to split the reformist vote.
“My view is that a consensus should be developed among reformists,” Khatami said.
Nodding to the criticism that he accomplished little in his eight years in office, Khatami said, “We should try to take steps forward and create changes, albeit small.” He seemed to want reformists to accept that with opposition to reform from Supreme Leader Ali Khamenehi, reformists could not think big.
Khatami said, “We are committed to Islam and oppose secularism on the one hand and violence on he other.”
He also said that it is a reformist principle to defend the rights of everyone who does not seek to overthrow the Islamic Republic.
Among those being mentioned as a reformist candidate are Khatami himself, his respected by uncharismatic vice president, Mohammad-Reza Aref, and Abdollah Nuri, a former interior minister under Presidents Rafsanjani and Khatami and a leading reformist voice until conservatives neutered him by jailing him in the late 1990s.
The reformists are widely expected to run on an economic platform next year, not making a major issue of political reforms or press freedoms. High inflation and shortages and the economic damage being done by sanctions make the economy the salient issue today. But it will be difficult for the reformists to do anything about sanctions without offering concessions to the West, which will send conservatives into to frenzy.
The biggest problem the reformists face, however, is their wilting base. Many if not most of those who voted for Khatami in 1997 and 2001 are disillusioned. Many have shifted from support for reform to outright opposition to the Islamic Republic. Others are focused more on how to get out of the country rather than how to improve it. Most have just gone to ground, ignoring politics as dangerous and concentrating on family and careers.
Where once Khamenehi was seen as a brake on reform, he is now widely viewed as a brick wall barring even modest reforms.
Where once the public routinely opposed revolution saying, “We tried that before and see what it got us,” now the view that revolution is the only solution is growing. That hurts not just the regime, but the reformists as well.
Yasser Azizi, 29 voted reformist in 2009 but told Reuters he would not do so again. “Any presence of reformists will be an appeasement and compromises with those in power,” he said.
It is that attitude that Khatami and other reformists are trying to fight. They seem to hope that Khamenehi will conclude that slamming the door on reform will only promote outright opposition to the regime while permitting reformists to have some power will reduce the pressure on the system.