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Al-Ahram Weekly 17 - 23 August 2000 Issue No. 495 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 17 - 23 August 2000 Issue No. 495
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Features Travel Living Sports Profile People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters A cause without a rebel
By Azadeh MoaveniAs bitter and dramatic power struggles go, Iranian politics has for two years had a remarkably stable dynamic. Reformist politicians cautiously push for institutional change, conservatives resist through their control of those institutions, and the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei presides over the contest with the savvy of a leader determined to stay put for years to come.
Two weeks ago, when Khamenei banned reformist parliamentarians from even debating a bill aimed at loosening press restrictions, all that changed.
"It will be a great danger to national security and people's faith," Khamenei told the Majlis, the Iranian parliament, in a letter, "if the enemies of the Islamic revolution control or infiltrate the press." Scuffles broke out on the floor of the Majlis and 60 reformist representatives walked out in protest as their chances for achieving their main goal -- one that is only moderately ambitious -- collapsed when the country's most senior cleric sided decisively for the first time with conservatives.
Khamenei's exercise of his absolute power came in the same week as the judiciary shut down the last major pro-reform daily newspaper, Bahar. The derailing of the debate marked the failure of the reformist parliament on its first serious test. Added to this, the political power whose permissiveness had allowed the "new, liberal" politics of Iran to gather two years of momentum, namely, Khamenei, suddenly presented significant opposition to the reform agenda.
With three of the last independent journalists remaining outside prison called before the conservative-dominated judiciary this week, the reform movement is for the first time largely without cadres, any mouthpiece, and the vital, tacit consent of the Ayatollah.
"Khamenei has always been very badly advised on the press," said one Iranian government official close to the reformists, in a July interview.
Reformists believe Khamenei's inner circle has always sought to convince him that the independent press is ultimately a direct, personal challenge to his authority.
Articles in independent newspapers obliquely criticising religious tyranny could easily have had the Ayatollah as their target, and with the political implications of a reform-dominated parliament still unclear, Iranian analysts say this is a logical moment for Khamenei to assert his supreme authority.
According to Iranian law, Khamenei had many legal channels through which to obstruct the bill without intervening personally. The Council of Guardians, a conservative body that reviews laws for their conformity with Islam, could have rejected the legislation. Had parliament challenged the rejection, the dispute would then have gone before the equally hard-line Expediency Council, which could have sunk the bill for good.
In Tehran thousands attended the funeral to lay to rest the recently recovered remains of 300 soldiers who died during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war. The conflict claimed the lives of 300,000 fighters. (left) Women read the Qur'an alongside soldiers' coffins; (right) President Mohamed Khatami mourns his brethren
(photos: AFP)
With these water-tight means of undermining reformist legislation, it seems that only a perception of his own personal vulnerability would explain the severity of Khamenei's decisions and his recourse to his personal authority.
Opposing policies that President Mohamed Khatami openly favours entails considerable political risk for Khamenei. The Supreme Leader has long exerted pressure from behind the scene. In April he met privately with the newly-elected reformist lawmakers after the press crack-down that saw 20 papers closed in two days.
At that time stability-minded reformists and conservatives alike boasted of the political relationship that kept the positions of both leaders secure while letting them agree to disagree in a way that satisfied the constituencies of each. The relationship was too fragile to last long: now Khamenei, in the public eye, is seen as a direct hindrance to the reformists agenda for change.
Reformist lawmakers, acutely aware that Khamenei's intervention could undermine public support for their legislative efforts, have already begun to do damage control. In an open letter to the nation dated 13 August, they pledged to "do all that is in our power to carry out our legal duties." The letter blamed conservatives for using Khamenei's letter as a pretext for a renewed wave of aggression against the independent press.
Whether Ayatollah's move has inaugurated a fresh attempt to beat back the reformists is not clear. What is clear is that the 30 million-odd Iranian voters who brought this parliament to power, feel humiliated and angry over their realisation that their loudly articulated voices mean nothing.
The silent, virtually absent figure in all this is, of course, Iran's president, who as usual has chosen to stay on the sidelines as a new stage in the battle heats up in the 10 months preceding the May presidential elections. In the eyes of many Iranians, his reticence does not bespeak of bravery and wisdom. They view it instead as the inaction of a religious politician whose first loyalties are not to his followers, but to the stability of the system.
President Khatami's famous slogan "long live my opponent" which won him support in a country more accustomed to wishing one's opponent death, will ring increasingly hollow when the political opposition cannot express itself, and his own re-election nears.
Without any serious rivals, Khatami's re-election is a foregone conclusion among both his opponents and supporters. But if 10 months of a muzzled press and an unabashedly partisan Khamenei are to follow, the president will need to take a radical stand to enter the presidential race without his integrity in tatters.
"We are certain that the recent commotion will not have any adverse effect on your will for reform," read the reformists' letter. Their task grows increasingly difficult: convincing an impatient, aware and long-suffering population to continue supporting a movement that seems more interested in shoring up support for the establishment than rehabilitating it.
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