Iran heads to presidential runoff on July 5 amid record low turnout Election News

Masoud Pezeshkian could benefit if turnout rises in the second round next Friday.

Tehran, Iran – Iran’s snap presidential election is heading to a runoff next week after reformist candidate Masoud Pezeshkian and hardliner Saeed Jalili emerged as frontrunners but failed to secure a majority in a vote that saw record low turnout.

Only 40 percent of more than 61 million Iranians eligible to vote cast ballots, the Interior Ministry said Saturday, a new low in a presidential election since the country’s 1979 revolution.

Final figures from the ministry’s election headquarters showed moderate Pezeshkian had won more than 10.4 million votes out of more than 24.5 million ballots counted, followed by former nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili with 9.4 million votes.

This is only the second time since the 1979 revolution that a presidential election has gone to a second round.

Out of the race were conservative parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, who received 3.3 million votes, and conservative Islamist leader Mostafa Pourmohammadi, who received 206,397 votes. Two other candidates, Tehran Mayor Alireza Zakani and government official Amir Hossein Ghazizadeh Hashemi, also withdrew.

Qalibaf, Zakani and Ghazizadeh called on their supporters to vote for Jalili in the runoff next Friday to ensure the victory of the “Revolutionary Front.”

The early elections on Friday came within the constitutionally mandated 50-day period to choose a new president after the deaths of Ebrahim Raisi and seven others, including Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, in a helicopter crash on May 19.

As with all major elections in the past four years, Friday’s vote saw low turnout, but the final figure was well below the 45-53% that exit polls had indicated.

The lowest turnout for a presidential election in the Islamic Republic’s more than four-decade history was the one that brought Raisi to office, at 48.8%. At just under 41%, the parliamentary elections in March and May were the lowest turnout for any major election since the 1979 Iranian revolution.

Voter apathy comes as many feel disillusioned following deadly nationwide protests in 2022 and 2023, and as the economy continues to grapple with myriad challenges including inflation of more than 40% due to mismanagement and US sanctions.

Iranian foreign policy expert Hamid Reza Gholamzadeh attributed the low turnout to what he said was the failure of the reformist camp to activate the segment of voters who usually vote for it and raise participation.

Despite the support of heavyweight reformists such as former president Mohammad Khatami and Hassan Rouhani, Pezeshkian “failed to awaken that part of society that usually comes when the turnout is above 50 percent — which usually comes from the reformist side,” Gholamzadeh told Al Jazeera.

“And I will interpret that as people saying they want change,” Gholamzadeh added.

A higher turnout seems likely when Iranians vote in the runoff on July 5, as it will present a clearer choice between two opposing camps. That would likely benefit Pezeshkian, who will need more votes to defeat the combined forces of the conservative and hardline camps.

Pezishkian, a prominent politician and former health minister, has the support of former centrist and reform presidents and other prominent figures. He has promised to lift sanctions by restoring the nuclear deal the country struck with world powers in 2015, bridging the ever-widening gap between the people and the establishment.

Jalili, a senior member of the Supreme National Security Council, has promised to reduce inflation to single digits and boost economic growth to 8 percent, as well as combat corruption and mismanagement. He is calling for a tougher stance against the West and its allies.

Pezeshkian was the only moderate among six people approved to run by the Guardian Council, the constitutional body that vets all candidates.

His supporters presented him not as a miracle worker, but as a potential president who could make things a little better, while claiming that a Jalili victory would signal a major setback.

Jalili’s name is associated with the years-long nuclear negotiations in the late 2000s and early 2000s that ultimately led to Iran’s isolation on the world stage and the imposition of UN Security Council sanctions.

The hardline politician, who has been trying to become president for more than a decade, blames the camp that supports Pezishkian for compromising the country’s nuclear program as part of the landmark agreement signed in 2015, which then US President Donald Trump backed away from in 2018.

Jalili and other conservatives accused his opponent of incompetence, and claimed that a win by Bezeshki would amount to nothing more than a third administration for former centrist President Hassan Rouhani.

Two security personnel were killed in an attack on their vehicle carrying ballot boxes in Iran’s southern Sistan-Baluchestan province after voting ended. According to state media, armed assailants targeted the vehicle as it was returning the ballot boxes to the local governor.