Assembly election heats up as Ayatollah Khomeini’s grandson indicates he will stand

Hassan Khomeini, the 43-year-old grandson of the founder of the Islamic Republic Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, has signalled he will run for the Assembly of Experts election in February. Despite a generally low political profile, Hassan Khomeini has expressed opposition to extremism and supported the nuclear agreement with world powers.

He has previously rebuffed suggestions he might stand for the Assembly, an 88-seat clerical body that chooses and supervises Iran’s supreme leader, or even for the presidency. Khomeini’s candidature now could help boost a loose alliance of candidates supporting President Hassan Rouhani.

In a speech to a group of reformists on 29 August, Hassan Khomeini quoted his grandfather’s final advice to his son Ahmad: “Imam [Khomeini] told my father ‘I am not asking you not to accept responsibilities in the Islamic Republic. If necessary, do whatever is needed and take on responsibilities, but if there are others [who can take control], let them do it.’

“Therefore, if at any time it is necessary for me to play a role, passing the buck will be a wrong thing to do, because thinking about personal or and hedonism is not consistent with Imam [Khomeini’s] thoughts and our ideals.”

These remarks were “unprecedented, which means he will run,” Saeed Laylaz, a reformist close to the government of President Rouhani, told Tehran Bureau.

“During the past few years, Hassan Khomeini received lots of requests from different figures and people to run in elections,” Mohammad-Javad Haghshenas, a political analyst, told Tehran Bureau. “His recent speech seems like an implied announcement of his nomination.”

Khomeini was apparently responding to Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, former president and chairman of the Expediency Council, who had encouraged Khomeini to stand. “Hassan Khomeini shouldn’t be apathetic about the future of the country,” Rafsanjani said in an interview with the weekly Toloo-e-Sobh published on 4 August. “It’s his turn now, and he should come forward to protect the revolution.”

Khomeini teaches as a cleric in Qom, where he also heads the Institute for the Compilation and Publication of Imam Khomeini’s Works, which preserves the late leader’s writings. The best known of his grandfather’s surviving descendants, Khomeini has been slowly drawn into politics.

In an address in 2011 to foreign ministry officials, he described “extremism” as “usually the greatest danger to a movement”. In 2013, he called the barring of Rafsanjani from the presidential election “unbelievable” and then supported Rouhani.

Khomeini has repeatedly praised the nuclear agreement with world powers reached in July. “Society is happy with the government’s achievement on the nuclear issue, this success is due to the prudence of the government,” he said on 19 July.

He has also spoken out against any branch of the military taking a political role. “People who claim they are faithful to ‎the Imam [Khomeini] must be sensitive to implementation of his explicit orders: the presence of a gun in politics means the end of all dialogue,” he said in an interview with Shahrvand-e-Emrooz magazine.

Khomeini’s popularity among many Iranians as the grandson of Ayatollah Khomeini helps explain earlier attempts by the ‘centrist’ or ‘moderate’ camp to lure him into a political role. But it also makes him a particular object of criticism. The fundamentalist cleric Ayatollah Mohammad Taqi Mesbah-Yazdi has indirectly compared Khomeini to Abu Jahl, the uncle of the prophet Muhammad who opposed him.

In April, Ansar Hezbollah, a conservative vigilante group, issued a statement warning Khomeini against giving a speech in Golestan province. Khomeini responded by saying he had not planned to speak in Golestan but added he would not have cancelled a speech in response to such warnings. And soon afterwards he visited Golestan, receiving a warm welcome from supporters.

Nevertheless, Khomeini has maintained good relations with different political groups and is widely respected. This would make him a formidable candidate in an Experts Assembly election that is shaping up as broad battle between, on one side, candidates including Rafsanjani and Rouhani, and on the other side fundamentalists including Mesbah-Yazdi, Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, the head of the Guardian Council and Ayatollah Mohammad Yazdi, the current chairman of the assembly.

“The triangle of Khomeini-Rouhani-Rafsanjani has already been formed,” Laylaz told Tehran Bureau. “Hassan Khomeini is a key figure in Iran’s politics, and I’m confident he’ll be elected.”

The Tehran Bureau is an independent media organisation, hosted by the Guardian. Contact us @tehranbureau

http://www.theguardian.com/world/iran-blog/2015/sep/17/hassan-khomeini-signals-ready-enter-politics