Thanks Mr. Zakani
Nov 22nd, 2009 by pedestrian
Really, this has got to be one of the most important pieces of – official state – news to get out after the election.
I know some of you have declared that the election is no longer an issue, but I beg to differ. Book after book has been written about the 1953 coup. So as a voter, I’d at least like to know more about what took place in government offices on the night of the election. At times it sounds like nothing less than a coup.
At the same time, I think some may be overestimating the power and the numbers in the Iran’s opposition. Ahmadinejad has been largely able to get a way with leading a huge coup and convincing a great many otherwise, so the stronger the argument’s of the the opposition, the more they will be able to create cracks in the other camp.
Alireza Zakani, a hardline, pro-government MP and a member of parliament’s election committee in a speech he gave in Imam Sadeq University has said that based on TWO polls the day BEFORE the election by both the INTERIOR MINISTRY and the MINISTRY of INTELLIGENCE, the results would be a close tie between Mousavi and Ahmadinejad. According to the SUPREME SECURITY COUNCIL’S reports the day before the election, the same results were predicted.
He also said that in a meeting that Mohsen Rezaie [the other conservative candidate] had with the council, he said that based on the given stats, 17 million votes were cast until 5 p.m. on election day and an additional 22 million votes in the remaining five hours would be impossible.
He also added that in the statement released by the six member parliamentary committee the lines congratulating Ahmadinejad were crossed out and this was done by “a source close to the speaker of parliament” [Ali Larijani] who has stated that “fraud in the election” had taken place.
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On the committee’s tasks:
The committee consisted of me (Zakani), Katouzian, Naderan, Abbaspour, Aboutorrabi and Kazem Jalali. We met with all three candidates. On the Tuesday following the election, we met with Mir Hossein Mousavi for one and half hours and Mousavi had nothing special to say.
Rafsanjani’s opinion was a council other than the Guardian Council:
A day after meeting with Mousavi, we went to meet with Rafsanjani. Rafsanjani stressed: “Mousavi did not give you all his arguments, he hid them from you. Because the day after the election, Khatami, Mousavi and Seyed Hassan [Khomeini] called me and came to my office.” Rafsanjani said that Mousavi’s request was another election and he also pointed out that he had reminded them [Mousavi and Khatami] to stick to the laws. He [Rafsanjani] also had a council other than the Guardian Council in mind to investigate the allegations.
Rafsanjani said that society has changed and that students are now at the forefront as opposed to the clerics. We can’t get these 3.5 million people to go home, we should meet their demands ourselves.
Regarding Rafsanjani’s letter to the leader:
[a few days before the election, Rafsanjani wrote a letter to the leader in which he warned of "forces" which want to create chaos in the election.]
Rafsanjani said that he had first sent the letter in private, but because the leader did not respond, he went public with it.
A few weeks before the election they [Mousavi camp] had found out that they would not succeed in the election, so they had planned to hit the streets and to slowly take away the leader’s powers. They have been working on this since the 80s, to slowly form a core outside the country, and they were even successful at bringing people like Nateq Nouri [Khatami's main rival in the 1997 presidential election] to their side.
Zakani referred to the Unity Plan brought forth by Nateq Nouri and said: “they wanted to make Larijani president and it’s interesting that even Rafsanjani came out and said that the unity plan is not my plan. It was Larijani and Nateq Nouri’s.”
Overall this faction used all its capacities and used the online world to the best of its advantage. After the sixth parliament [when all the reformist MPs were banned from running again] the reformists reached the conclusion that their agendas would go nowhere, so they organized well throughout the years and we saw that even groups of 20 to 30 hooligans were organized and were able to create chaos.
Only the government polls showed that the election would go to a second round
All the polls, even the ones conducted by the university showed that Ahmadinejad would win. Then, on the days before the election, on June 10th and June 11th, polls by the interior ministry and ministry of intelligence and also the Supreme Security Council indicated that voting would go to a second round.
After the elections, we understood that those forces which planned to create chaos even had members in the ministries.
Rezaie said that he would follow his complaints in a lawful manner
In a meeting we had with Rafsanjani, he said that Rezaie believed 32 millions votes were cast in this election and that the remaining 8 million votes were fraudulent. He said that up to 5 p.m. on election day, 17 million votes were cast and it was impossible to have another 21 million votes in 5 hours [voting ended at 10 p.m.]
Later on repersentatives for all four candidates had a meeting with the leader and criticized the process in the harshest ways.
We were willing to count all the boxes
Referring to the committee’s meeting with Karoubi:
Karoubi also made claims of fraud and he said that last time [in 2005], he’d had 3 to 4 million votes and this had decreased to 300,000. His allegation was that for instance, in some voting center in a town like Bojnourd, he’d had 200 votes before, and he had that this time too. But in the remaining 700 boxes in that town, he’d had a total of 400 votes. We told him we’d be willing to count all 700 boxes.
This is how the counting process works: after the counting of votes in each box is complete, the results are written on 5 sheets and the representatives at that center sign them. One goes inside the box, two go to the interior ministry and the remaining two to the Guardian Council. Therefore, the difference between the Council’s result during counting with that of the interior ministry is not an indicator of anything and we must wait for the final result.
In the committee’s final statement, the conratulatory note to the president was crossed out
The Friday Prayer led by Rafsanjani
Rafsanjani claimed that on the day of the Friday prayer, the population was split 50-50 and apparently Larijani was the one to give him this estimate.
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Rafsanjani’s office has released a statement that Zakani is not authorized to quote him and his quotes are not credible and have no legal basis.
[h/t Naj]
I noticed the speech but wasn’t able to translate it effectively. Can you give us at Enduring America a couple of translated passages on the above points? I would like to run as a special feature.
Dear Pedestrian,
very shortly ago I felt it absolutely necessary to state:
“The highly differentiated statements made by you and your friendly and reflective contributors don’t leave me in peace !
All these statements are highly well-founded and seem to cover different, justified, various, multifarious aspects of the truth, which only thus shows a picture approaching its usually high and manifold complexity !
Thus: Chapeau to You and Your contributors/commentators/readers ! ”
I N D E E D ! ! !
Thanks for Your persistent and stubborn investigation.
Thrice “Chapeau” again to You !
and of course to your intellectually/politically highly alert, aware and at the same time unusually friendly contributors !
German
Valuable post, Ped.
I’m really curious about the specifics of the government polls taken before the election, such as how they were undertaken, the means of gathering, locations, etc.
The contention over “21 million votes in 5 hours” is another circumstantial element to throw into the mix.
At this point, being half-American, I recall our own disputed presidential election in 2000, where there was actual supporting physical evidence. However, our legislative branch failed us and our judicial branch ruled along biased partisan lines, so we were left to accept a result which was proven wrong. Now, in the Iranian case, the situation may be not too dissimilar. However, the biggest difference from my own humble perspective, is that the main source of contention to the Iran vote is circumstantial, where before in America there was actual physical proof.
Have I missed something?
naj, I think so too that he’s throwing stuff out there to see where it goes. But he gives some very interesting stats/info in the process. Larijani never denied congratulating Mousavi, and now this … The most interesting thing to me is that it’s becoming more and more apparent that there were lots of backroom dealings and lots of backroom planning that we’ll never know about (of course anyone would know this) but just reading hints of it even by a lunatic is intriguing.
Hashemi has issued a statement about Zakani, that he is not authorized to quote him! http://www.khabaronline.ir/news-26245.aspx
As far as I can see and as far as I know of any media reports and assessments in English on the Iranian election
the document (appearing to be somewhat confused?) here translated/published by you
is the only one coming as close as possible (at present) to a key piece of documentary evidence of a possible / of the electoral victory of the Iranian opposition.
Possibly only Scott Lucas/Enduring America seems to have noticed that so far ?
Hmmmh – rather strange.
addendum:
It’s a / THE sensational trouvaille !
Do you know if people are still going out to socialize on Thursday and Friday nights just like they used to?
Pirouz, sorry about that. I missed your comment.
I think the nature of the physical evidence is different. They’ve raided the offices of Mousavi and Karoubi, they’ve refused an independent investigation, they arrested many of the pro-reform activists less than 24 hours after the election. No, none of this of course PROVES fraud, but in this circumstances, even gathering enough proof is just about impossible. How were supposed to gather any evidence in such a circumstance?
naj, thanks for that. I will add it to the bottom of this post.
Pensive Persian, those people I know still socialize at their old hangouts. Fere-e Kasif in Apadana St. etc, etc are still up and running and as crowded as ever.
German, this guy really is crazy and as Naj said, he’s throwing things all over the place. But since he apparently presents himself as a pro-government speaker, it is interesting to hear his take on this and try to put this piece of the puzzle with what we already have.
take a screen shot of the original website/text, for God’s sake !